Common Sense Media Review
By David Wolinsky
,
based on child development research. How do we rate?
Psychedelic mix of landscapes, music is quite memorable.
Parents Need to Know
Why Age 6+?
Any Positive Content?
Where to Play
Videos and Photos
Panoramical
Parent and Kid Reviews
What's It About?
PANORAMICAL is a game that has no story. There are no characters. And without a narrative, there are no blatant lessons to learn. After a brief tutorial to hold down a button and move around (be it the mouse or a joystick), you understand that your movements directly affect the color, shapes, and music taking place on-screen. What unfolds may be a nature scene or some very psychedelic abstract shapes. What you learn from that is up to you.
Is It Any Good?
This musical experience is so, so, so weird but in a very good way. What's key to appreciating it is throwing away any preconceived notion of what a game "should" be and then realizing it's more of a toy you mess with than "make progress on." You're free to pass from one blank screen to the next by holding down the space bar, and from there you begin to tinker with your controls to tweak the music in the background and the visuals on-screen. What emerges is entirely up to you based on the pre-running default images and melodies in the blank screen: By holding down any one of nine keys and moving the mouse around, you bring different visual and audio effects into play. The result is mesmerizing, bewildering, and entrancing. Watching clouds and rain or jagged lines and shapes emerge out of the nothingness, and then finding the perfect visual to complement your current mood or make you laugh, is the sort of experience only a computer or a digital game can offer, and this takes ample advantage of that. As such, it's hard to chart on the "good/bad" binary, but it certainly is memorable and hard to put down.
Talk to Your Kids About ...
Families can talk about the expectations they have from a video game. When something doesn't meet your expectations, what is your reaction? Why?
What is the value of a video game that's more like a strange musical instrument than something you can "beat"?
Game Details
- Platforms : Mac , Windows
- Pricing structure : Paid
- Available online? : Available online
- Publisher : Finji
- Release date : September 17, 2015
- Genre : Simulation
- Topics : Fantasy ( Magic ) , Animals ( Ocean Creatures )
- ESRB rating :
- Last updated : October 1, 2025
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