First of all, not a bad buy on discount (get the bundle for the entire series). I enjoyed it and occasionally had to look up a walkthrough for certain stages.
The story deals with occultism and you get to discover the background of the Vanderboom family and how things came to be through navigating a literal family tree with branches representing different offsprings.
I'd say the puzzles are medium-difficult. You may have to take notes at places just to record all of the information being presented, but nothing that'd require you to put down paragraphs of text, no; At most, you'd have to draw a few diagrams and do some elementary calculations.
I purchased Rusty Lake Hotel because of the whimsical looking art and cheap price. I enjoyed it, although I found myself a bit bored, with its puzzle solving a bit on the easy side... however, the weird characters, and the dark humourous absurdity of it overall left me with a positive impression.
So going into RL Roots, I expected something similar, and was pleasantly surprised that it was way better.
Although the weird animal people were gone (mostly), substituted was a darker tone that definitely took some risks. Now, the game isn't so shocking that it breaks the overall tone of the series, but it's definitely ... more... than Hotel was. You'll follow the story of a family through their generations, and the game has 33 mini sections that are overall quite satisfying. The puzzle solving is never so taxing that you won't be able to figure it out, but it's not trivial enough that the game becomes a pointless clicking simulator. Especially towards the end, you'll have to think about some things.
Also, after the game there is an optional quest that you can take, which adds a little bit extra for those who wanted something more difficult.
Now, I gave this a 5 stars for what Rusty Lake is... it's still a point and click game that is quite slowly paced. However, I liked this so much more than Hotel. Full of creepy and weird things, decent to interesting puzzles, nice graphics/audio. I would 100% recommend this if anyone enjoys Rusty Lake (but you've likely already bought it).
If you enjoy puzzle games, and point and clicks, then also, a recommendation. You'll definitely get your money's worth. I completed this in an afternoon in between other work and chores, and for that, it was perfect.
If you liked Rusty Lake: Hotel, then you'll probably like this title. It follows the family that settled the area and you play across several generations of the family tree. It has the same art and puzzle design of Rusty Lake: Hotel, but there are a lot more of them this time around. And, unlike Hotel, you can pull out of a puzzle here and jump into a different one if you hit a wall, which is nice.
The puzzles are pretty good, though there is some repetition in the puzzle types. Occasionally the puzzle mechanisms aren't clear (I got stuck on one where I knew the right answer, but couldn't input it because it was unclear how the answer entry fields worked at first). But these are minor things. Overall the game is fun, quirky, odd, and well-done.
It's not a particularly long game, though it is much longer than Hotel. Still, I found it a great game to play between longer, more serious games. Like a palate cleanser for a few evenings between main courses. Definitely recommended for fans of puzzle genre games.
It's a fun little point and click adventure game, where you follow a family through a few generations of life on their estate, witnessing people get born, grow old, get murdered, and practicing dark rites. I like the hand drawn aesthetic of this game. The puzzles are fairly straightforward, some require thinking, but no moon logic or pixel hunting. There's 30 some levels, that are mostly just one screen each, each depicting vignettes of in the lives of the family. I picked this game up on sale for under $2, and it gave me a day's worth of entertainment. Would recommend if you're looking for a light point and click puzzle game, and enjoy some Edward Gorey levels of grisliness along the way.
So it's basically a point and click puzzle game with a story of sorts. What makes it interesting is the generational story of the Vanderboom family, about 3 generations over 75 years, all in the same house and well, this family is full of unhappy wierdos. There's maybe one remotely normal person in the entire game and everyone is else some kind of messed up in a way that just contributes to the inherent tragedy of this entire family.
The game makes this clear from the start, just in case you were expecting something chill, and then it gets pretty surreal at points in a distinctly lynchian manner. In the end it's generally comprehensible and does tell a pretty decent story with almost no dialogue or text, almost entirely though visuals. The atmosphere is constantly gloomy and creepy in a gothic manner and that's the big draw here.
On the mechanical side, the puzzles are generally well done and varied, and I only had to check a guide a few times in the entire game to figure out just what the game expected from me. There are clues enough for the most part to figure out what you're trying to accomplish and to get you going, and it helps each room is self contained so you can expect everything you need to solve a puzzle to be in that room(the exception being the endgame where you have to use clues from one room to solve a puzzle in another room). It also helps that in most of the game you have more then one room available at a time so you can always jump to another room if you're stuck on one, though you'll eventually have to solve all of them to finish.
It's pretty cheap and will likely last you a few hours(depending on how quickly you pick up the puzzles). Your enjoyment/engagement will hinge a lot on how much you like the atmosphere and puzzles so if creepy puzzle games peak your interest, give it a try.
