Puzzles are at the core of Adventure gameplay, they provide challenges for you to overcome with brains rather than brawn. For Action Adventures, they offer a break from the hacky-slashy-stabby-shooty element of title.
Every week I’ll bring you a new puzzle, drawn from some of the best and worst adventure or puzzle games I’ve ever played. Every once in a while I’ll even leave you one of my own for you to solve. If you do, I’ll find a way to reward you!
This week, and relating this week’s puzzle, I give you a cryptographic puzzle. It’s a simple substitution puzzle. You need to decipher the message. For convenience, every word is separated by ++.
╖╥ ++ ╚─╡ ++ ┼┌╟╙ ++ ╬┘╖╫ ++ ╬┘┌╩ ++ ╚─╡ ++ ┘╟╣┌ ++ ╫─l╣┌╙ ++ ╬┘┌ ++ ┼╖╙╙l┌ ++ ╟╩╙ ++ ┌╟┼╩┌╙ ++ ╟ ++ ╥┼┌┌ ++ ┼╟╥╥l┌ ++ ┌╩╬┼╚ ++ ╥─┼ ++ ╬┘┌ ++ ╡┐└─║╖╩╨ ++ ┌╜╬┼╟ ++ l╖╥┌ ++ ╛┼─╟╙└╟╫╬ ++ ╫╬╟┼╬╖╩╨ ++ ╬┘┌ ++ ╫╖╜╬┘ ++ ─╥ ++ ╩─╣┌║╛┌┼
This puzzle is from the exploration game Homesick. If you read the review I wrote, you know it made me very emotional. This puzzle comes in late in the game when you reach a family home. Inside you find letter blocks, like the type used by children. The puzzle is finding them all and deciphering the strange alphabet you find across the game, much similar to the cypher puzzle I’m introducing in this issue. It takes trial and error as well as exploration, looking in every nook to find the one cube you missed.
The reason I like this puzzle is that it open up the world for you. The more you decipher, the more you learn of the lives of the building’s tenants. It’s then that the game truly begins in a way, as it becomes possible to learn of their fates, to take a look at their lives and see their hopes and dreams. And perhaps, as I did, you can see your own hopes and the things you’ve lost.
If you’ve solved this week’s puzzle drop a comment, be the first, it’s important!
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