Welcome to Thimbleweed Park, a town down the road and round the corner, population 81 (at first), where a dead body lies pixellating under a bridge. A town where you "use" (thing) "on" (something/someone) as we all did once upon a time. A town outside the spectrum, that watches what you do, where a burnt out pillow factory and an abandoned circus are as run of the mill as the cake shop selling vacuum tubes.

It is a place that even on a first look, you may well want to visit, particularly if you want a game that feels like the games we used to play. There are other games that try to be like that, but not all of them have this development pedigree.

I am up to Part 3, have invested about 5 hours of play time, and judging by the Steam achievements have many more hours to go. Not everything has tickled my fancy but much has. Ransome the "beeping" Clown was in the former, most everything else in the latter. Given the way Thimbleweed Park pokes fun at the genre and its creaters (e.g. MMucasFlem), not even I (who dislikes the convoluted solution when there is a far more straightforward one available) could fail to appreciate the starting the fire solution. And the staircase solve bordered on hilarious genius.

There is a lot of to-ing and fro-ing, and I suspect there is much to explore and find that will have nothing to do with solving the murder (if that is in fact what my ultimate objective will be). The books in the library are a case in point. You can play on hard or casual (I haven't compared them yet). And I am sure I saw a tentacle.