This is the screenshot that accompanies the 1001 writeup for Samorost, a point and click game that follows a little space gnome on a mission to avert disaster for his home.
But you wouldn't know that from that screenshot. Your first reaction to it is probably similar to my own: what the heck am I looking at here?
Fun Times
Samorost turns out to be a Flash game, which is still freely available to play once you tell your Internet browser of choice that, no, this instance of Flash is safe. Thanks for your concern, Chrome, but I trust this one.
You usually imagine Flash titles to look like Flash titles if you know what I mean. They could be well polished in the graphics department, but they have a look about them. Not so with Samorost, with its detailed Photoshopped landscapes made up of macro photography of trees and rocks.
Ah, there's the Flash-style graphics we're familiar with. This is the unnamed gnome that is the star of the show. Once you click his lookout tower (it's highlighted with an arrow, so you should be able to find out where to start), he makes a startling discovery in the darkness of space.
Another ship is on a collision course with our home. What can we do? It's time for an excursion.
Rocketing off, we land at the bottom of a grassy, mossy mountain, dotted with some kind of farmers, perhaps. We can interact with them, to some degree, and it seems our focal point is this chap at the front, smoking away instead of working. Or maybe he's the boss, what do I know?
We need to firstly find gnome, and then somehow get to the left of the screen, again subtly hinted at with an arrow. So that's our goal for this screen; how do we get there?
Frustrations
Point and clicks, by their nature, are full of trial and error. I'm not a fan of clicking around with no progress being made, and I'm a bit stumped by this one.
It wasn't too long before the boss, we'll call him, ran out of stuff to smoke and dropped his pipe, which could be used as a key to start a motor. The motor operates something on the mountainside, but it doesn't seem to do anything. The workers don't do anything, apart from one, who goes for a little walk when you click on him. Finally, there's a signpost that you can turn into a few different directions.
How do all of these combine into a solution?
Remembering that the Tab key works wonders in Flash games, I find some kind of interactable element in this yellow box, but it takes a short while for me to realise that it's the rope, not the wheel, that is the problem.
Oh, a ski-lift, of course it is. So the sign now has something to do with someone's direction, and the walking worker can be moved out of the way of what looks like a ramp to where I need to go... yes, the solution makes itself apparent, and away we go.
Further Fun Times
Subsequent screens serve up similar little puzzles, and they look fantastic. Sometimes the brain teasers were simple, other times I had to double-check a walkthrough, but I wasn't ever met with an instant game over or an impossible to escape situation. The solution was always within reach if you just found the right things to click on.
I can't think of a single other game that looks like this, Flash-based or not. Samorost is mesmerising, charming, weird... It makes no sense and doesn't have to, and I found myself doing whatever I could to try and help gnome out.
Finding a machinery room, we push a couple of buttons and find out that we've done it. We've diverted the ship and have saved the world, little though it may be.
And that's that. We fly home and celebrate while the credits roll. I was expecting it to be longer, yes, but this is a Flash game, I suppose, and it tells a little story while challenging your brain.
Final Word
If you like it, there are a couple of sequels to try, and not to spoil the 1001 list, but the developers will be back later with another title with a look of its own.
I got a little stuck in places, especially with that ski-lift, but for the most part, Samorost was reasonably straightforward. Maybe I got through on dumb luck. Didn't feel like it - I've got smarts somewhere.
Its big selling point is the graphics, but the sound is pretty good too, and anyone who knows how to move and click and mouse can get in on the action - so long as they know how to run Flash on the Internet these days.
There's not much to it, and you can complete it in your lunch break, but it stands out against a great many other games you can play in that sort of timeframe and is easily recommended, whether you like the genre or not.
Fun Facts
The word 'Samorost' can be translated several ways but is also the name for a kind of sculpture made from discarded wood.
Samorost, developed by Amanita Design, first released in 2003.
Version played: Flash/PC, 2003.