Finished I Am Dead (Hollow Ponds, Richard Hogg / Annapurna Interactive, 2019)
To be or not to be in Shelmerston.
Pro:
At the end of the day this is still a hidden object game, even though the promotional materials call it a "puzzle adventure" and I always feel that even the best hidden object games could easily be even better with another mechanic or two, so no top score - but I don't think it can get much better than this in this genre.
4/5
Previously reviewed in this thread [here].
To be or not to be in Shelmerston.
Pro:
- Lovely music (including one original song), distinct picture-book-like artstyle that reminded me of Mutazione and a story with surprising emotional punch - I Am Dead is no doubt and by far the best hidden object game I've ever played.
- Four difficulty levels that co-exist side by side:
There's the mandatory things you have to find in order to progress in the story and eventually make it to the end credits, those are the easiest.
Then there's objects which are only given to you as a cross-section and you have to find and rotate and bisect them just right - but you get help with a hint that such an object is on the current screen and you get an acoustic indicator and controller rumble if you're close - those are a little harder.
Then there's a bunch of objects you need to find to get a couple of achievements - those get pretty serious.
And finally there's a list of objects to find which is itself hidden in an object - and once you find it, it turns out the list is given in the form of riddles. These are the trickiest and are unlocked only towards the end of the game. - There is more to the setting than initially meets the eye - as I progressed through the different locations, I found that Shelmerston - and indeed, the world that Shelmerston exists in - is not quite what I expected and that really kept things interesting for me.
- More a word of warning than a complaint: Even though the mood of the game is generally uplifting and comfy - death, loss and memories of the departed are strong themes throughout the story - depending just on how strongly these resonate with you, this game might not be something you would want to pull up carelessly during lunch-break at work. It got to me a couple of times.
At the end of the day this is still a hidden object game, even though the promotional materials call it a "puzzle adventure" and I always feel that even the best hidden object games could easily be even better with another mechanic or two, so no top score - but I don't think it can get much better than this in this genre.
4/5
Previously reviewed in this thread [here].
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