Firmament

At first, I was somewhat dissapointed in Firmament. After backing it on Kickstarter and waiting 4+ years for it, it felt a bit "sterile" at first. After the grand opening of Obduction, and the legacy of Myst and Riven, I didn't know what to make of it on that steep icy mountainside. But then, the game started to get better and better in my taste. The adjunct (the remote corkscrew thingy on which the gameplay is focused) turned out to be a rather nice and unique way of solving puzzles. The puzzles were amazing, especially in VR; they were very environmental, meaning that you had to look in all directions to get a good overview. They never became problematic, so no pen/paper or walkthroughs were needed. For some, they might've been too easy, but for me it worked and contributed to the immersion. Each of the realms has its own environmental puzzles that tell you something about the story (i.e. the function of each realm). The storytelling is different from many other games, and in the end I quite like the approach. Bits and pieces came to you from comments of your "mentor" (meaning your ethereal side-kick who turns up as a small cloudy ghost from time to time), the environment and some documents. It's all pretty vague until the last scene, where everything falls perfectly in place. Nicely done! Graphics and sound are beautiful; the game has a sci-fi-steampunk-cogwheel-feel to it, and the electronic soundtrack works excellent with it. Moreover, the game has its own architectural style, which adds to the uniqueness of the game. In the end, as the game unfolded it went from a slight disappointment to one of my favorite adventure games, and I personally find that amazing. You have to enjoy the tech-oriented approach, but if you do so and you can appreciate the unique presentation, you're in for a treat. Lastly, I didn't encounter any problematic bugs at the time of writing (upon release little over a year ago there were some).

This game has a feeling of emptyness that makes sense due to the story; you will only realize this once you complete the game, leaving you feeling like the world is very empty. I liked Obduction better, because it felt more alive with all those different people that I saw messages of, etc. That aside, it is a pretty good game, with some solid puzzles. They start out simple and get more complex as you go through the game. Though... I had best mention that most of them are simple order of operations ones. The major differences are in how they are presented, which is done fairly cleverly most of the time, to avoid making them feel the same. How about story, sound, visuals? Yeah, they're all there and they're all good. These arn't major points to me as this is the kind of game where I want story, exploration and puzzles primarily. I did have to look up solutions to puzzles a couple times; longer ones can get obtuse. I rate this four stars because I went looking for a good story, puzzle and exploration game and that's exactly what I got! I rated Obduction 5, due to it drawing me in more and feeling more real. Is this worth a buy? Yes! Is it probably worth waiting for a sale? Also yes.

First, I'd love to give it five stars. The game is a gem for puzzle adventure lovers. The worlds are beautiful and creative. Full of strange machinery and tasks to figure out. You are the only one around. A female voice is sometimes talking to you out of nowhere giving you a bit of a background. I enjoyed exploring each world and getting them started. The puzzles are on the easier side of things. After you figured out what to do in one world it's not that hard to do similar things in the other ones. The adjunct is the one and only thing you really use in this game. It does everything making the puzzles even easier and predictable. This is a bit of a downer as I was hoping for more variety. The story itself is good but doesn't really build characters like we've seen in other cyan games. The various notes and books are either mostly useless or just not very revealing. Only towards the finale things clear up a little more. But overall I'm missing this deepening of all the various characters and happenings of the past throughout the game. The release version suffered a few bugs most of which are widely documented on various forums. However the game is overall working well and bugs can be worked around through using the "safe place" option in the settings menu or simply reloading the game. No blocking issues for me and these issues don't go into my overall score. So 4/5 for a very nice adventure that's a bit too easy / repetitive for my taste. Yet it sucked me in like only Cyan games can. I only wish I didn't finish it so quickly.

Firmament is truly a game that had high expectations amongst Cyan's community fanbase However, I'm setting aside said expectations to review the game as is to give a fair opinion for both players of Cyan's Fanbase and those who are fresh to the comapny Environment and Atmosphere Incredible. The environment was simply beautiful. Many were a time where I would find something new and couldn't help but smile as I looked out into the terrain. Even doing some back-tracking on my end, still had a way of making me stop to appreciate the view one last time. The atmosphere however felt still. Sometimes I would hear noise in the background along with some music but most of the time I was often met with absolute silence, aside from an announcement which quickly became repetative. To add, walking is completely silent, which feels like a huge miss on atmosphere building The Gameplay Discovering worlds, following forgotten paths and figuring out puzzles is what made my gameplay feel refreshing and fun! but there's a flaw which I can't ignore and that would be my exhaustion. I felt as if I were constantly battling to maintain interest in what was happening around me. The narration that promised mystery and deception ended up not following through until the very end of the game What disappointed me most, however, was the actual lack of enviromental interaction. By which I mean, yes we could interact with machines and puzzles, but aside from 3 books and an Adjunct to interact with plugs. Nothing was really present for the lore of Firmament Final Verdict My total opinion rests on this Firmament is honestly a great game. But many expected a product that was more complete than what we recieved. HOWEVER! I truly believe that with time, Cyan will update and correct many features and bugs that will end up giving a better experience for future players of Firmament. My current review is to wait until there are a few patches before making a purchase Praise be to the Firmament!

Played through this game on Steam in a mix of normal ("pancake") mode and VR mode. Aside from the bugs, I really enjoyed it! I would say Firmament is about as easy as Myst - a game I was able to finish without ever checking a guide. (And WAY easier than Riven - a game I had to use a guide for MULTIPLE times.) The story and world building was interesting enough, and I LOVED the ending. Others (who are sharper than me) may have seen it coming, but I didn't. And the final area was stunning in my opinion. Cyan has stated that they wrote the lore themselves, and used A.I. tools to help present the lore to the player, which seems strange but at least it's not as egregious as simply generating all the lore from scratch with A.I. I suppose. (Still bit of a murky area though, especially since some of the art was generated that way.) When I played it, the bugs were SO bad that they had to add a "recover stuck character/reset puzzle" option in the menu screen (something I don't think exists in any other Cyan game). And considering that the puzzles are a major part of the game... it's a pretty bad look. Still, I thought most of them were fun (especially in VR) so I still enjoyed them overall. But your mileage may definitely vary. Firmament is far from perfect, not Cyan's best work, and yet STILL worth a play-through.