The Eyes of Ara

A hidden-object type game disguised as a puzzle game.
Good parts overshadowed by bad ones in a constant rollercoaster of emotions.

The good parts are the visuals, the style of the castle and some clever puzzles.
One of the above mentioned clever puzzlesd gets immediately ruined by an added part that is mindnubingly stupid for execution and placement.

Having to constantly click everywhere to trigger small hitzones to discover stuff gets tedious very fast.
The uswer interface doesnt give clear feeedback of interatable objects.
Succesful resolution of a puzzle often has no audio or visual feedback leaving the player confused on the next steps.

The puzzles near the end of the game become an exercise in frustration, because key elements need to be clicked in badly light enviroments and with no mouse-over interacation prompts.

The realization that some elements that seemed just secondary collectibles now are needed for the completion causes some annoying backtracking and pixel hunting.

The last puzzle is a mathemtical slogthat would have been more appropriate midway through the game, instead of pissing of the palyer one last time with tedious number fumbling.

In an age of of very rare decent puzzles game that arent all Myst-clones, this stands out a bit and for that reasons its worth playing, despite all the above mentioned issues.

The Eyes of Ara Is the best Puzzle game I've played in the last Few years! There are Adventure games where you have to fear dying in the wrong Decisions or improper operation of Devices. The Character can't die in this Game. You can experiment around so much, test Settings and watch the Results as you please. There is also no time Limit at The Eyes of Ara. The Player can take as much Time as he wants for each Puzzle. Even more annoying are Games where the knob tasks are neither logical nor make any Sense and one wonders where the Solution to the Problem should come from. This is definitely not the Case in The Eyes of Ara. I could invariably SOLVE ALL Puzzles without Help. The Difficulty of each Puzzle varies widely. There are very simple ones (especially in the first Chapter) where it is immediately clear what to do, but also heavier ones, where wild Clicking Around is of no use and you have to strive for your grey Cells. The Mix of Puzzles has succeeded, so the fun of The Game does not diminish. In order to solve Puzzles, it is essential to keep your Eyes open. All Numbers/Letters/characters distributed in the Environment help the player solve certain Puzzles. No Number is just there. With some Puzzles, you have to spin Things or push them together. If you come close to The Solution, the Puzzle automatically jumps into the right Position. This is very helpful and is very disturbing in Games where you have to hit every Pixel exactly. There is a Bonus Room that you can only unlock if you have found all Things (Photos, Coins, paintings, Action figures and Spheres) in each Level. To experience the End Of the game, you don't have to find 100% of these Things. It's worth it though, so you should check out every Screen right from the Start. Unfortunately, I have been able to find two Coins and one Photo only with the help of the Solution. That was because these Items were extremely well hidden and I ran past them tens of times. Luckily, you can play through every Level (including the End) and go back to every other Level and keep looking. To unlock some Steam achievements, I also had to look into the Solution, as some Actions are absurd. Thankfully, the Achievements for the Outcome of the Game are completely immaterial. The Sound of the Game is minimalist but suitable for the Atmosphere. Controlled without problems with the Mouse, the Inventory can be hidden if it interferes. The Graphics are completely successful and convincing. The Translation of the Game contains a few Spelling Errors, but the Game is completely playable in German. This is not to Say that you don't have to communicate with any Human being throughout the game, you don't have to run from Pontios to Pilate to Deliver any Parts to anyone. You stay within a Chapter in a few Rooms and you don't have many Opportunities to look for dead yourself. Someone wrote in a Review that the Game is a Must for all mystery fans. I've played all the Myst titles and I claim: This Game is better than all Myst games, even if it's little comparable. The Myst worlds are much bigger, there are more Machines that need to be got going and less real Thinking Than in this Game. The Eyes of Ara reminded me more of The Room games, although it is much more complex. With this Game I had just under 16 Hours of real Gameplay without a single Bug or Game Crash. Therefore, I can recommend this game to every Knob Fan without exception.