Nina Penner's Reviews
Tukoni: Forest Keepers is a picture book turned point-and-click adventure. Kids are apt to be drawn to its cute characters and simple story but will need adult assistance due to a lack of a tutorial and clunky controls, while adventure game fans are likely to be disappointed by the depth of the gameplay. Aside from the gorgeous hand-drawn visuals, there is little else to maintain adult engagement.
Big Walk is a game about walking and talking with your friends through a gorgeous visual and sonic environment modeled on the Australian bush. Escape-room-style puzzles offer just the right amount of challenge. It’s a game that encourages trust, bonding, and communication. Walking the island, our momentum picks up as the vistas, free public transportation, and smartly designed puzzles inspire us to focus on enjoying our time together. The game principally cultivates affinity, and it shines bright in the epiphanies sown throughout the friendscape, shared warmly and excitedly between players.
Until Then: Afterimages is a much-anticipated expansion to the hit Filipino visual novel/adventure game. This substantial DLC offers the same poignant, realistic writing and cinematic art direction that made the base game such a success. It offers 2 new chapters featuring Mark and Sofia, which wisely focus on interpersonal relationships and slice-of-life activities over paranormal occurrences.
Lost in Art: A Miniature Realm is a concise point-and-click puzzle game that takes place in digital recreations of Persian and Ottoman miniatures. The art is desktop-background worthy, the puzzles are varied, novel, and approachable, and the music is historically and culturally appropriate. The extensive in-game glossary offers a treasure trove of knowledge about Anatolian culture.
Duppy Detective Tashia is a concise and breezy point-and-click adventure. Made and set in Jamaica, it features a colourful cast of characters drawn from Caribbean folklore. Players new to the genre or to this folklore tradition are likely to appreciate its in-game glossary. Genre veterans may find the game rather short and lacking in mechanical depth and novelty.
House of Hikmah is a narrative-driven 3D puzzle-platformer that explores themes of grief and legacy through alchemical puzzles and conversations with luminaries of the Islamic Golden Age. Audio is a standout with its Arabic voice acting and soundtrack featuring virtuosos of the Arab world. The game had some rough edges at launch, but all serious issues have been patched at the time of writing.