The meat of what makes Viewfinder good is in its technology; how the people who made this managed to pull off these optical illusions so well without a hint of stuttering or long loading times is astounding. The problem with that is this makes the rest of the game fall into a sort of tech-demo feel, where all the puzzles are a bit too easy and the story is so barely there that it hardly matters.

If you have any skill with puzzle games, it'll take you at maximum maybe 3 to 4 hours to complete, maybe more when it throws the more abstract ones at you and you get stuck like I did. That's not to say the puzzles aren't good, but for $25, you would really expect more from something like this.

I really don't know how puzzle games are still going for such a stale type of story. And it's not even a particularly well written one. Each of the characters only exists in the context of what is happening, even though the game uses the recordings you find scattered about to tell you bits and pieces of how their time inside the simulation was spent but it's always so shallow and so short.

Also now that I'm thinking more about it, I think that Cait was a below average companion, but at the time of playing he was so much more bearable than Jessie that I was grateful that now I only had to listen to him. And the fact that you can choose to just ignore Jessie's messages after Cait starts talking to you makes me think that the developers know how it could get annoying to hear her talk like that all the time. Her character almost feels like commentary on these types of interactions in other games and how obnoxious they can be, and how good it would be to just turn them off or ignore them.

I feel like while the difficulty curve on this is almost flat, there are some pacing issues that make progressing a bit annoying at time. But the puzzles themselves are really fun and imaginative. I wish there was more.

The tech, the environment and the puzzles are really special, it's just a shame that it's gone in the blink of an eye and that the story is so boring.

Once again, another puzzle game with a fascinating and original mechanic cripples itself with a naff story. Viewfinder is frequently surprising and has some pretty decent puzzling, but good lord the story is beyond mediocre. It wouldn't be so bad if it would just shut the hell up for a minute rather than constantly battering you with meaningless audio logs and incessant companions. Apparently, a pleasant English woman talking at you all the time isn't enough, you also need a pleasant Scottish cat to tell you how clever the puzzles are.

Even I feel that that was probably too harsh. But to be honest I'm so tired of playing these puzzle games that have such an interesting idea but instead waste time on nothing stories rather than building on the concept with more levels. Viewfinder is only about three hours long if you're experienced with this kind of game, so it doesn't have the room to cram in a saccharine and confusing yarn that could have been pulled from any other middling Portal-like. Just as Superliminal, Turing Test and Light Matter before it, Viewfinder ultimately fails its genius central mechanic.

There is plenty to be praised here though, don't get me wrong. The photo placing and manipulation is an idea that is as technically impressive and innovative as the Portals in Portal were back in 2007. The levels are fairly well paced too, but I found the levels I truly enjoyed were the optional puzzles, which were a lot trickier than the main content. Ideally more of these would have been fantastic. Portal can rest on its laurels in terms of optional content because Valve knows they have a willing fanbase who will churn out content an unimaginable rate, but indie puzzle games like Viewfinder don't have the luxury of mod tools, so need to come with more content. As it stands, I can't say that even half of the puzzling potential has been extracted out of Viewfinder's concept.

My opening tone is less an indication of anger and more frustration. I'm disappointed that such a great idea feels somewhat squandered, but perhaps I should be analysing what is here rather than what could be. And what is in Viewfinder is largely pretty good. Tune out the story and don't bother with the collectables and you'll find a fun, occasionally challenging puzzler that frustrates as often as it delights.

a neat little concept absolutely destroyed by horrible writing and horrible voice acting. you can get away with one or the other, but hearing dishwater-dull Fuck Yeah Science lines read in the cadence of someone trying to sell you car insurance made me speedrun the game just to get away from it.

i should've muted the dialogue... i could've had fun with this if i did... i was a fool

i hate the cat so much

This is an A+ puzzle game held back by a C- story.

Viewfinder’s first impression is that of a gorgeous, but unremarkable perspective puzzle game in the same genre as superliminal, manifold garden, antichamber, and arguably the unfinished swan. Two things immediately become clear.

Firstly, the game never stops talking to you. I adore voice-memo walking simulators (you can see my review of Tacoma for evidence), but not only is this game extremely flat and cliché in its dialogue writing, the voice acting performances seem designed to grate players looking for a thoughtful, quieter experience. I can see this game being explicitly designed for with an audience of children/non-gamers in mind — the powerful rewind ability and built-in hint system seem to point to that — which would explain the tone. If it is intentional, I wish that the team had chosen otherwise. Why does this game about a creative team of artists, engineers, scientists, and mathematicians have to be about a building a top secret super weapon to save the earth from climate change? It’s not that you’re not allowed to tell that story in a game, it just feels like this gameplay-focused first person puzzler where the only in-game NPC is a cartoon cat is a top 5 worst places to tell that story.

Second, this game’s puzzles are great. Beyond great, actually; every new chapter introduced clever gimmicks that harmonized with the core mechanics while leaving room for less flashy variations on the core mechanics. I ended up completing the entire game and all optional levels without really intending to. Despite only getting stuck on one level, I left feeling completely satisfied and hugely impressed.

I can’t wait to see what this studio makes next. Whatever it is, I’m just praying that they leave out dialogue.