The Minims
Beyondthosehills
My first look indicated it was
quirky, serene and a delightful pleasure. I have to say it stayed like
that all the way through.
Mii is a Minum, who awakes from
a dream to find his pond in need of a clean. The fish is an issue that
must be dealt with, and then how to clean? Some to-ing and fro-ing and
its mission accomplished, and then its time to wake Mo.
Except Mo is missing.
What follows is a search for Mo,
and for Mii’s inner being. It’s a deeper piece than its surface
suggests, and while there are some literal leaps of faith, it isn’t
overdone, and never becomes overwhelming. While there is more to it, I
was still looking for Mo, and I found her.
The look of the game is
appealing, simple and colourful, with Mii at the centre. It never ceases
to amaze me how expressive two eyes on a blob can be. Especially one
that only talks in speech bubbles. I liked Mii, and his quiet
determination to get things done.
Like many adventure games,
puzzling involves exploring to find and use items in the correct way.
There are a very few straight out puzzles, but by and large you will be
gathering things to use in generally straightforward ways. The red cloth
threw me, but I chuckled when I got the hint that told me what to do.
Unlike many adventure games, you
don’t move Mii around the various environments in the usual way.
Sometimes Mii will move somewhere else, but he is just as likely to stay
where he is, and shift his perspective so that you are looking at (and
therefore able to interactive with) a different part of the scene. Its
kind of like zooming in, and you can often see Mii standing where you
left him.
An important part of this aspect
is “dragging” the environment around you to be able to look at different
things. By holding shift and dragging the mouse, you effectively have
360 degree panning from the perspective you are currently viewing. On
more than one occasion Mii didn’t move from where he was, but I searched
an entire landscape through multiple shifts of perspective, some only
accessible from other shifts.
If it sounds complicated, in
operation it really isn’t. And Mii does bounce around from place to
place, as well as ride the occasional vehicle, so he remains a key part
of the exploration, even if you aren’t moving him everywhere you go.
As indicated above, there is no
spoken word. But Mii is a rather chatty fellow, and has plenty of
conversations. A rather excellent score accompanies much of his
meandering, and keeps things on that serene keel.
It is a gentle, even kind game,
in more ways than one. I had to calm a character on one occasion by
soothing him with music, and find a way to tempt a scared hamster out of
his hiding place. Mii clearly has a good heart, and a genuine belief in
others.
The game saves when you exit,
and picks up where you left off. You can get hints from the menu screen,
which are really answers, so use them sparingly. I never did find a way
to scroll through my inventory, so resorted to using items until the one
I actually wanted rolled into view. It is probably my only quibble.
It took around five hours, and I enjoyed
every one of them.
GameBoomers Review Guidelines
March 2016
design copyright© 2016
GameBoomers
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