Samorost 3
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Samorost 3
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A Lot or a Little?
The parents' guide to what's in this game.
What Parents Need to Know
Parents need to know that Samorost 3 is a downloadable puzzle game that on the surface looks friendly and inviting, but those images hide a great deal of tough challenges. It's a weird and fun game, but it also requires a great deal of patience and comfort with not understanding at all what you're doing, where you're going, and even what needs to be done. Trial and error is the lifeblood of games like this, and that includes building up an awareness to the types of things you didn't even realize you were accidentally ignoring.
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What’s It About?
In SAMOROST 3, you play as a strange little space dwarf in a white jumpsuit who visits nine very different and strange alien worlds to trace the origins of a magic flute that suddenly comes into your possession. The worlds all contain strange and colorful creatures who need your help in doing the types of things you normally do in adventure games: fetching items for other people by arranging what you have and seeing Rube Goldberg-style chain reactions.
Is It Any Good?
Sometimes, you need a game that you know you'll be working on for a few months, if not the better part of a year. Samorost 3 is that sort of game, a quiet and patient point-and-click adventure game that implores you to reflect, think, and wonder about what you've seen and what you can do. The puzzles and how strange they are is heightened by the fact that you won't find a single word of English, so you have to truly pay attention and be aware of the things you might not even realize you can interact with or try. If you like having your brain poked and prodded and tested then this, absolutely, is a game to check out.
The people who created this game have made a bunch of others similar to it. They know what they're doing, so you're in good hands. Unlike other adventure games that might play cheap or expect you to poke around every screen for every tiny stray pixel you might have missed, this developer's sort of adventure games are more about trying concepts out than desperately poking around; for example, early on, there's a mysterious box with levers to control a bridge, and you must actually destroy the bridge rather than create some sort of path to someplace. This isn't an easy game, to be sure, but if you're looking for something different, this certainly fits the bill.
Talk to Your Kids About ...
Families can talk about how often works of fiction use words and dialogue when they may in fact not need to. Does a story that's light on dialogue seem more or less successful than ones that are very wordy? Why, or why not?
What's the appeal of a video game that doesn't hold your hand and leaves it up to you to figure things out and harvest epiphanies?
Game Details
- Platforms: Mac, Windows
- Pricing structure: Paid
- Available online?: Available online
- Publisher: Amanita Design
- Release date: March 24, 2016
- Genre: Puzzle
- Topics: Magic and Fantasy, Adventures, Space and Aliens
- ESRB rating: NR for No Descriptions
- Last updated: March 8, 2019
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For kids who love puzzles
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