It feels like new games are just more of the same, with no real meaning. However I recently started playing “Return of the Obra Dihn” and love open ended deduction in it. It feels like I’m actually figuring things out by myself without being handheld through it. Are there any other games that don’t coddle the player that you guys recommend?
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I am not sure how handholdey it might seem to you, but Danganronpa 1-3 were pretty good at keeping me guessing what would happen next, but it is also good at giving the player the illusion of actually solving what was happening themselves. V3 was both the best and worst in this regard IMO. There are very few times where something is obvious or very easy, and likewise few times where a huge leap in logic is made or something is very obtuse/hard to know.
If you haven’t tried them, maybe look intonthem to see if you’d like them?
I remember distinctly Danganronpa’s problem with shock value.
I finished the first case of the third game, and thought “Wow! That was incredible! I hadn’t anticipated that ending at all!”
And then, once the dust on the case had settled, because of the effects of that change in circumstance, I had no interest in playing the rest of the game.
That’s unfortunate. But I suppose not every game is made for every person to enjoy. The first was a game of its time, and the rest followed the first.
Maybe you might like Master Detective Archives RAIN CODE a bit better, since it has some elements of similar gameplay, but also has, perhaps less “shock value” than when the dust settles on cases in Danganronpa.
EDIT: I didn’t see you were talking about V3. Yeah, lots of people don’t like V3 for various reasons. I wasn’t a fan of the end of the first case either, but I still played through and it was okay, but then the ending I just didn’t like at all.
Check out Fez if you haven’t already. Also Tunic does a great job of starting out basic & breaking precedent.
I watched a fascinating video describing Tunic, Outer Wilds, and Sekiro as knowledge based rougelikes. Where in playing the game you learn information (or enemy patterns in Sekiro’s case) that make additional playthroughs vastly different.
If you haven’t, watch some Tunic speed runs, as once you know where certain things are you can almost break the game without actually breaking it.
The Long Dark
Survival game set in the cold Canadian wilderness. Most “survival” games are actually just boring crafting games but TLD is very different for me as it is mostly about exploring in the freezing cold with natural predators around to keep you on edge.
The Painscreek Killings sounds like the open ended deduction that you’re describing. You play as a journalist who goes to an abandoned town to try to solve a cold case murder. The game doesn’t tell you where or what to do next, or how to do it. I liked it because it was just me trying to figure the story out and what to do, not the game telling me “Put x and y together. Oh, look, it leads you to z!” (Also it’s currently on sale on Steam for like 5 bucks.)
Dread Delusion:
- Great plot, lore, and writing in general
- A lot of moral dilemmas to solve and hard choices to make
- Choices don’t change much in gameplay, but they change a lot in writing and that is interesting to read
- Doesn’t handhold player much, but is way smaller than Morrowind for example, way less content and side quests and thus feels more linear
- Lowpoly/lowres and kinda rough even by lofi standards, but certain consistent aesthetic which creates coherent worlds that are fun to explore
- Combat is way too easy, even bosses are not challenging; recently hard mode was added, but I haven’t tried
- There are some minor bugs and glitches
Not sure if it aligns with the original ask, but it is a great game. Definitely feels like a more compact morrwind (and I think it’s better for it). The world building and lore is fascinating and definitely worth a play for any fantasy rpg fans.
Not a puzzle game, but Noita throws you right in without any explanation or tutorial. Everything is trial and error to the point where people complain that you can’t figure things out without the wiki. Love the game though, one of the most unique games I know.
The Souls games never really held your hand either.
Hollow Knight, The Binding of Isaac and Elite Dangerous are other games I can think of that want you to figure things out.
The witness is a really interesting puzzle game that can be had for not that much.
Or if you are looking for something more actiony then I would recommend remnant: from the ashes or remnant 2. Described as souls like with guns, but they really change up the formula I found with semi random worlds and bosses.
Chants of Sennaar - adventure/puzzle game where you need to learn the languages of the world. It’s not super difficult, but finding all the secrets was challenging.
Manifold Garden - no real story here, but a trippy 3d spatial puzzle to navigate.
Was waiting for Senaar
Other wilds as already suggested Is a must play. But a strong second contender for me Is cocoon. Logic/environment puzzles, with no hand holding in any way, you have to figure out everything but the level design Is sooo good.
Honorable mention for Tunic.
The Talos Principle - It’s pretty much purely a puzzle game with a nice dose of philosophy to drive the story along. Some of the later puzzles can get pretty difficult, and some of the optional challenges will likely take you a good while to figure out without guides.
If you’re liking the feeling of solving a mystery with no handholding, give Shadows of Doubt a look. 1920s detective noir set in an alt-history retro cyberpunk 1970s where the Coca-Cola corporation is the president of the USA. Yeah, that’s a mouthful, but what you get is a proper hard-boiled detective story where you are in total control of how you pursue every case. The game gives you an honest to God murder board with string and sticky notes. There’s no “detective mode” bullshit where you scan for clues and then the game solves the mystery for you. It’s completely on you to find the evidence, follow leads, canvas witnesses, scrub through security footage, stake out a suspect’s apartment or place of work, and finally make an arrest (and hope like hell you didn’t finger the wrong person). This all plays out in a fully simulated city district. Every room in every building can be entered. Every NPC has a complete life; a partner (maybe), a home (usually), a job, a medical history, a shoe size, fingerprints, the works.
The voxel graphics aren’t for everyone, and there’s some areas where it’s less complete than others, but those only really stand out because of how shockingly complete the world is in so many other ways. All in all, it’s a brilliant game, and like nothing else out there.
I love the concept but honestly I can’t solve shit. I even got a side mission once to take a picture of a vague description of a person who lived on the 4th floor of an apartment. Thankfully there was only one apartment on that floor. Unfortunately there were two people who lived there. And neither matches any of the descriptors.
And that’s the side jobs. Murder? Forget about it, I got no clue.
Any idea where I could learn?
Yeah, hit up YouTube, look for tutorials. There are some great guides to things you really should know (the game’s tutorial is minimal at best) and handy tips for crime solving. Some of this stuff you can figure out in game with some intuitive leaps, like looking for security footage, or checking sales ledgers in stores to find out who bought a murder weapon. Other stuff is a little more obscure.
The game is still early access (or only just recently left it) so you also probably ran into some bugs. There are/were some missions that just spawned wrong and couldn’t be completed.
I’ve tried it, but couldn’t really get into it. Didn’t feel like there was much deduction, but more just evidence collecting. However I didn’t play for too long and I’m planning to try again. I assume it takes same time to get invested
Maybe you should try a more chaotic approach to solving the crimes in that game, like Josh does in this video
- That’s a link to a video from Let’s Game it Out. Josh’s thing is playing games the “wrongest” way possible.
Hide the sausage.
Man. I’ve been staring at this box trying to find the words for why you should play Pathologic 2. It’s hard, especially without spoiling anything. It is a game about a surgeon named artemy burakh who is tasked by fate to save a town from a plague. It is as if Russian Literature grew legs and used them to kick you in the dick. It is emotionaly a lot. It is skillfully a lot. It is mentally a lot and you are on a time limit and it is not fair. But it has a message for you. There is a beauty to that message and if I could I would force every person on this planet to experience it.
But you will have to bleed for it. Please play it.
Is this playable for someone who is a bit sensitive towards blood, but really sensitive towards arteries?
Blood plays a very large part in both the story and game
Arteries also play a very large part in both.
The game would definitely make you think and confront those sensitivities directly and often.
Thanks for the answer. Seems like I need to skip this one. Shame since it looks really cool
Just Incase it could make you reconsider, the game is disturbing in a myriad of ways, basically designed to touch deeply any person who engaged with it. It should be thought of less as a game ment to be enjoyable and more like art that you “should” experience. Though I understand it isn’t for everyone. Hell, vast majority of people who think it is for them dont finish the first day of the game. But there is a message in that game worth seeing. Either way, I had to try one more time. I respect your decision either way.
Those are totally valid point and I thank you for making them. I need to see whether parts of the game feel tense which is fine, or they make me physically impossible for me to play, since some sort of description of blood and venes just makes my head spin and knocks me out sometimes.
I get the great artistic picture and how the game is not meant to be nice, since it does not deal with nice themes. I’m happy the artistic vision got through and it seems to be a succes based on community response
It’s not difficult but I really enjoyed Super Liminal. Very short but fun.
If you like Obra Dinn, you’ll love Outer Wilds
