Update Twenty-Six: 23 July 2017
Under Leaves
2.3 hours, 21 of 21 achievements
tsuper review: 7/10
☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆
Aww, that was cute. Under Leaves is a watercolor nature hidden object game of the most traditional sort. Like an animated picturebook. You go all over the world and help animals find things. It’s short, and it’s sweet, and I got it for like a dollar (or less!) in a sale and found it perfectly worth my money. It’s a tiny game for a morning’s play, and would be a nice way to introduce a child or an elder to video games.
Beyond that, there’s not much to say. Tiny games get tiny reviews. I did wish there were more settings - there’s only five or six, and you return to them for the game’s 20 levels. For the standard price (5 US American dollars) I’d want different settings. That’s just me though.
Next up: Monthly challenge, two of five - existential robot time is my favorite time.
See you soon!
Under Leaves has been on my wishlist and I was really tempted by it in the sale but I’d already bought far too many games lol, maybe the next one, it does look like a really cool short experience. The Turing Test was fun, I hope you enjoy that. The difficulty wasn’t too hard which I was kinda thankful about as it meant I didn’t have to use a guide which is always nice!
Yeah, I liked it! It’s not a OMG BUY IT NOW, no reason to drop cash on a game that’s just going to sit for months, but yeah keep it on your wishlist and pick it up someday. These nice watercolor animals aren’t going anywhere c:
Thank you! I hope so, too. People really cite it as taking inspiration from Portal and the Talos Principle, and what d’you know those are some of my most favorite games. I’m also always pumped to play a science lady
Aw I just completed Under Leaves the other day too, cool to see someone else talking about it. :) Agreed that it’s a sweet lil hidden object game! Gorgeous illustrations.
Ohhh, I played through The Turing Test last month. Have fun with it:)
I’m glad you liked it :) I also thought it’s a shame that they didn’t come up with more art of this quality for backgrounds.
Tiny games get tiny reviews
Agreed. It always surprises me when people write whole essays about like 1-2 hour long games. If someone spends more time writing about the game than playing it, imo they’re doing it wrong ;)
I mean…. I definitely think I could write a 10 page essay on the Beginner’s Guide, and you can run through that game in an hour and a half or so. There’s a difference - this game is tiny in concept, in mechanics, in scale and in length. That’s four parameters I pretty much picked out of thin air, there could be more to talk about, easily. The Beginner’s Guide might be tiny in length, but very deep (it made me feel things about myself, Narayan!!!) in those other categories and you can get a lot of stuff out of it. Wait, shit, I did write an essay on it in college. It wasn’t 10 pages but -
All right, wait, let me condense: I understand your sentiment but I won’t agree because a lot about art, the best art, leaves you thinking about it long after you’re done experiencing it, regardless of just its temporal length of experience. Does that make sense?
the best art, leaves you thinking about it long after you’re done experiencing it
That’s true, but that’s what discussion clubs and friends who also played are for, if you want to share your thoughts in detail. School assignments and other writing forms might be ok as well. I don’t think writing in-depth analysis in a review is appropriate, because a/ you’ll be just littering it with spoilers, b/ you’ll be basically telling other people what to think about the game before they even had the chance to play it and experience on their own, c/ writing that a game is like a work of art and it touched you profoundly (if it did) is imo quite enough. So one sentence ;)
You know what? you’re right.
I completely overlooked that while writing about [thing] is one thing, but there’s differences in what type of writing you’re doing. A critical essay is not a ‘here’s what it is and how successful it is at what it is so you can decide if you yourself want to play it’ review. A review is not the place for an essay, your original argument is one I now completely agree with.
… now I want to make a video game book club where everybody plays a game and we discuss it critically in-depth this is something I need
This comment was deleted almost 7 years ago.
I just wrote something at your last post… well here I go again :)
Cute games are always nice! Glad you enjoyed it :)
Have great fun with Turing Test :)