Hidden object games can do a few interesting things when they pull away from the usual mould and that’s exactly where My Hidden Things excels. Each puzzle is a single screen of objects pulled together like a eye trick for you to find or build the silhouettes you are looking for in this monochrome world. It is strangely engrossing and enjoyable for its short stay.
The entire game is monochrome which takes a bit of getting used to but it allows your eyes to focus on shapes and putting your brain into gear to fill the gaps. Puzzles revolve around characters living in a city and their daily struggles with life. They hide their problems from the world but these puzzles lay out their problems for us to see. It is a clever piece of visual storytelling that means you discover more about the characters just by playing and immersing yourself into the game of finding the right thing. Character stories also start to cross over later in the game which I very much enjoyed.
Each puzzle asks you to find three or four objects in among the picture and you can pull objects about and move things around. Some objects can be combined, others pulled apart and some just make interactive noises or actions. Where My Hidden Things excels is when it does something you don’t expect. One level has a light that turns on and off showing different objects under different light sources. Another changes items from innocent objects to ones of sinister natures as seen through the eyes of the character and not you. Again, all of this is subtle but really effective story telling. I wanted more of this to come out over time but the first half of the game is very much straight forward hidden object discovery. The rule changes and innovation pop up later on.
The result of all of this is a concise 2-3 hour experience that feels a bit like the Hidden Folk series or a Where’s Wally game but is telling a story of much darker proportions underneath. It is short and sometimes you have to wrestle with being very precise on where you click to get things to work but on the whole, this is a really surprisingly engrossing experience. I did wish for more audio in the game though. It sticks with object and city sounds which is fine but I feel like some mood music may have made the experience a bit more zen.
Stylised, interesting and doing something different than pure hidden object puzzles, My Hidden Things is well worth your time.
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