The Adventures of Tintin: The Game is a game based on The Adventures of Tintin, a series of classic comic books created by Belgian artist Hergé between 1929 and 1983. It is released as a tie-in for the 2011 Spielberg animated movie The Adventures of Tintin: The Secret of the Unicorn and follows the story. The plot is based on events from different comics, including The Crab with the Golden Claws, Red Rackham’s Treasure, and The Secret of the Unicorn.

The game is a side-scrolling 2D platformer with minor puzzle elements to take out enemies and finding a way to proceed to a next area. Tintin is able to sneak around, steal keys, hide inside barrels, throw objects, roll, grab ledges, and jump to reach platforms. Fights are based on stealthy takedowns, but there is also regular melee combat. In later levels guards are well armed and the player needs to use objects in the environment such as banana peels or wet paint to take them out. Occasionally there is a level boss. Tintin can also send Snowy to sneak through gaps or command Haddock to stand on a pressure plate.

The Solo mode starts at a flea market in Belgium where young reporter Tintin buys a model ship. A collector appears shortly after and tries to buy it from him for ten times the amount. Intrigued, Tintin is brought to someone knowledgeable who tells him it is a replica of The Unicorn, a triple-masted ship of Charles II's fleet, that was blown up by its own captain when it was attacked by the Red Rackham in 1676. Tintin wants to find out why the captain sunk his own ship and finds a document inside the model, but the collector returns and sneakily steals the ship from him. With help from Snowy he tracks down the collector's house and from there the quest to unravel the secret of The Unicorn kicks off. He ends up at the ship SS Karaboudjan where he meets Captain Haddock. From there they travel to Ben Salaad’s Palace, then to Bagghar, a fictional port city in Morroco, and finally back to the home town of Marlinspike.

The game is interspersed with small sequences where it moves away from 2D platforming. These 3D segments include fighting on motorbikes during a chase, plane flights, scent-tracking with Snowy, diving, and on-rails sword fighting sections that are played out aboard The Unicorn back in time. The game can played in a separate Cooperative mode with Tintin, Haddock and opera singer Bianca Castafiore. These separate sets of levels require players to work together as each character has a different skill. Tintin uses a grappling hook, Haddock moves crates and breaks through walls, and Castafiore can double jump and break glass. There is also a Challenge mode where players can compete against each other.