The puzzles keep coming.
Last week was an Italian job set during the renaissance, this week it’s a thoroughly modern affair with Emily (close enough) in Dimhaven – The Lost Source.
The House of Da Vinci and Dimhaven – The Lost Source share quite a bit of DNA, including the same publisher in Blue Brain Games, but also differ in a number of key areas that I believe makes Dimhaven slightly superior.
Developed by Zadbox Games and published by the aforementioned Blue Brain Games, Dimhaven – The Lost Source is a puzzle game set on the titular, fictional island of Dimhaven, where everything is a bit odd in a sort of Hot Fuzz sense. Although whereas Hot Fuzz had a cast of quirky villagers to liven the place up, Dimhaven has nothing of the sort. In fact, until late in the game, you’ll have only interacted with two whole people on the island.
You play as Emily who’s come to Dimhaven to find her Uncle Zach who has mysteriously vanished. You’ll progress through a number of, once again, escape room-esque puzzles trying find some trace of him. Initially this involves the standard working out a code for a locked door or finding the key to a locked box but very quickly, it’s only a 3–5-hour game, delves into the weird and wacky.
Last week, one of my complaints was the paper-thin story of The House of Da Vinci. Well, this week, my complaint is that the story of Dimhaven – The Lost Source is far too complex. Not to say that it is particularly complex, but when packed into such a small game, and with most of that time spent trying to figure out how to open various rooms and boxes, you’ll find that the ending makes about as much sense as a chocolate teapot.
As you uncover layer upon layer of a conspiracy dating back decades, you’ll be treated to the devilish puzzles set out by the developer, and unlike House of Da Vinci, there’ll be no handholding this time. In fact, outside of a few verbal clues from Emily herself, you’ll have to do all of the puzzling out yourself. There is a hint system, but the game goes to great lengths to warn you that it will ruin the experience should you give up easily.
And credit to Zadbox, these are some of the more creative ways of disguising codes and keys I’ve seen in a video game. Don’t play this one tired or hungover as I did, you’ll need all your wits about you to make any real progress.
Assisting with this endeavour is your trusty camera, allowing you, at the very least, to take pictures of the clues you find, rather than trusting your ailing memory, that can’t quite remember a time before the world was a furnace, let alone five numbers it saw mere moments ago. In addition there are a number of picture challenges for the completionists among us, I am not one of you, therefore I did not keep my eye out for many of them, but they do add a dash of humour to a somewhat bland world.
Mechanically the game works in largely the same way as House of Da Vinci, point and click. You may equip items to interact with the world by using the scroll wheel on your mouse, or by accessing the inventory. Other than that, there isn’t much to it, a good thing really as any more complexity and my mind would be distracted from the real task at hand.
In terms of graphics, it’s best not to expect much, the character models appear as if from the early 2000s, and the pixelated nature of the world gives it a retro feel that sometimes works, but in others just looks very grey.
I would suggest that Dimhaven – The Lost Source is for those who like a challenge, don’t mind no instruction, and love taking notes. It’s not a particularly cheap game for what it is, coming in at around £15 on Steam, but your mileage may vary.
Lastly, just a quick note on the ending, which I won’t spoil, but if you’ve ever seen Arrival, to me it makes as much sense as that, in that it doesn’t. But if you can embrace the nonsensical, then you might find a fun, challenging experience awaits.
World Cup is nearly over, France vs Spain tonight. I am concerned about what I will become once this structure is removed from my life.
