The very brief Adam’s Venture has a nice, shiny exterior, and actually feels adventurous in its physicality, but everything else is the very definition of “just okay”.

Diamonds in the Rough is based on an interesting premise, but its generally dull implementation prevents it from realizing its potential. Indie fans may find it worth a look, but others may want to think twice.

A journey down The Rivers of Alice brings winsome sights, innovative music, and intricate puzzles, but the philosophical waters are deceptively shallow without much story cohesiveness or character development.

Decay: The Mare may fall foul of overused horror tropes, but its occasional impressive flourishes and ability to build atmosphere help raise it above its clichéd premise.

AER creates a beautiful fantasy world with a wonderful flying mechanic to explore it, but ultimately doesn’t give players much to do besides repetitive platforming puzzles.

What it lacks in challenge or stylish graphics, Clarevoyance makes up with its light resource-management mechanics and conversation-heavy gameplay to provide a fun diversion into the local history of its unique maritime Canadian setting.

As standard as both the point-and-click gameplay and production values are, Nobodies manages to carve out its own niche by giving players’ twisted imaginations a bit of free rein.

Though it doesn’t quite disguise the lack of variety in puzzles and locales, Tick Tock: A Tale for Two offers a fairly novel collaborative two-player approach to problem solving.

Ghost In The Mirror: Episode I — Here Be Dragons is a decent game that showcases good writing, haunting pixel-art graphics, and energetic sound. It would benefit from a more standardized menu and clearer instructions for its mini-games.

An uneven game of kaleidoscopic highs and somber lows, N.E.R.O. rewards patient exploration, connect-the-dots plot analysis, and an appreciation for nature’s surreal beauty.

After surviving the first Chronicle of Innsmouth, Lone Carter returns in Mountains of Madness, which attempts to ambitiously expand its predecessor’s narrative scope but is unable to successfully scale that particular peak. There’s a lot to like and a noticeable graphical improvement, but ultimately this entry will go down as the weaker of the pair.

Though it clings a little too tightly to its classic retro roots, the first episode of Fester Mudd is a short but decent comedy western.

Telltale's production quality is remarkable, and they must be commended for at least pushing the series violently towards what is sure to be a fascinating climax. However, the game must also be criticized for the inconsistency of its flow and the near-complete lack of original locations and characters (Stan's delightful return notwithstanding).

Jupiter & Mars is the kind of game you need to go into completely aware of what to expect. Its gameplay and narrative are likely a bit too shallow for newcomers to take the plunge, but those in the mood for a chill ocean exploration experience will definitely find some enjoyment here.

Down the Rabbit Hole faithfully and vividly recreates the roller-coaster feeling of bouncing through Wonderland’s zany environments in VR, even solving some engaging puzzles along the way. Unfortunately, it’s let down somewhat by a lackluster narrative and weak character interactions that could have made the whole experience far more memorable.

Though some technical and uncompromising design issues occasionally hinder the experience, Døm Rusalok captures the delight of aimless teenage wanderings set against the creepy backdrop of urban legend, and its oblique Russian charm ultimately makes it worthy of a look from horror fans.

During the hacking portions, you’ll feel smart and invested in your detective work. During the story/chat portions, you’ll likely find yourself often bored, distracted, and wondering how much longer you’ll have to keep smashing random buttons on your keyboard. GREYHAT is a game with a great concept and many good ideas that needs to de-emphasize its weak parts and focus on the well-realized fun of hacking into other people’s computers.

It lacks a certain surprise factor that [the best games in the series] have pulled off so well and despite having an interesting premise for a plot, at times it comes off as flat and doesn’t live up to the potential that such an intriguing plot could have had.

Overall, The Silent Sky Part 1 is a decent game with a compelling story. However, some elements could frustrate players, such as the lack of a hotspot indicator and the timed puzzles.

While the uneven Devil’s Daughter doesn’t reach the heights of previous games in the series, there is enough here to warrant a playthrough and fans can safely add this to their expanding collection of the super sleuth’s adventures.

Taking the retro look to a whole new level with its distinctive 2-bit(ish) graphics, The Land of the Seazogs is a fairly fun and challenging little science fiction point-and-click adventure.

She Sees Red is a highly atmospheric, well-acted (but poorly dubbed) interactive movie that will keep you engaged for about the same length as a film before faltering a bit under its limited choice format.

The most devoted series fans will probably still love it, but newcomers should check out life as a defense attorney first. The rest of us are likely to find it entertaining enough at times, but a little too meandering, a little too mediocre to fully live up to the Ace Attorney legacy.

Lucifer Within Us shows a lot of promise, with a creatively imagined setting and a unique take on its subject matter, but this tale of daemons and detective work seems so determined to cross its own finish line that it never feels fully realized.

With an eclectic cast of characters, the simple but charmingly cartoon-styled Edgar: Bokbok in Boulzac keeps players guessing what they’ll encounter next in this bizarre quest to save a squash farm.

Captain Disaster in Death Has a Million Stomping Boots is a lighthearted and enjoyable point-and-click adventure with a good story and plenty of humour to help overcome the modest presentation and a few noticeable weaknesses.

The Walking Dead’s middle instalment begins with an overly long, slow burn, though it gradually builds toward the tense excitement that series fans have become accustomed to.

Alternately compelling and maddening, INFRA requires a lot of patience but provides a uniquely grounded adventuring experience.

Well-versed in early 1900s Viennese culture, The Lion’s Song practically plays itself, so the main draw of this four-part interactive anthology is its beautiful sense of time and place.

It's not without its rough edges, but Doc Apocalypse is an intriguing, original title that's well worth your time if you're looking for a budget sci-fi indie adventure.

Worth playing through for the story, but questionable design issues prevent it from being nearly the classic that comes bundled with it.

The Revenge of Johnny Bonasera is buoyed by its colorful cartoonish art, evolving story, and excellent puzzle design across its four distinct episodes, but it’s hindered throughout by a lack of depth and nihilistic toilet humor.

A good game is smudged by some obvious flaws in the gameplay that prevent it from standing with the greats. But fans of classic gaming will get a generally enjoyable game due to the story, inventory puzzling, diverse characters, and good looking graphics.

Player agency may be minimal throughout, but for those willing to work through all the reading, Lightstep Chronicles provides a gorgeous and compelling story of Artificial Intelligence gone horribly wrong.

Quest for Infamy is an ambitious, often entertaining homage that has all the ingredients for success, but the overall experience is impaired by uneven humour and lacklustre combat.

If you want to spend 15 or so hours exploring a creepy New Orleans manor inside and out, engage in some fun puzzling and giggle nervously like a little kid every time something leaps out from the dark, then get hold of Last Half of Darkness: Shadows of the Servants.

While it takes a few narrative missteps, The Thin Silence oozes raw emotion as it courageously bares the suffocating reality of depression and loneliness, yet still manages to be a fairly entertaining game in its own right.

Still a solid game, but the venerable series is starting to show its age by recycling many elements.

On paper, The Suicide of Rachel Foster promises a spooky ghost tale grounded in the drama of a family driven apart. While some of that potential is eventually made good on, the road there is a bit too bland and unengaging to make the whole experience shine as brightly as it should.

Chasing Static offers a brief and intriguing foray through a foreboding retro-horror landscape, but its barebones story and under-explored ideas make it feel like a warm-up instead of a main event.

My Beautiful Paper Smile drops players into a dark, captivating world of masks, monsters, and malice seemingly torn straight from a mad poet’s notebook, though its many memorable shocks can’t entirely distract from its frustrating gameplay elements and deceptively simplistic narrative.

A reasonably enjoyable game that aims to appeal to adventure and RPG fans, but one which never fully capitalises on its potential.

More quirky than funny, A Dreadly Business is by no means spectacular, but nor does it do anything wrong, settling for being a solid, well-made debut episode.

With colourful hand-drawn animation and plenty of dino facts to learn for kids and adults alike, Zniw Adventure excels in providing a fun ’90s-tinged trip down memory lane, though it includes certain outdated mechanics that would have been best left extinct.

With the right expectations, The Cabinets of Doctor Arcana can provide some solid gothic puzzling fun for several hours, though not much has been done to deviate from the same types of challenges we’ve seen a thousand times before.

The Antidote is a charming and brain-teasing throwback to the weirder adventure games from a bygone age. Its focus on abstruse puzzles might be a turn-off for newer fans of the genre, but its tightly written script and peculiar visuals offer a memorable experience that should be worth a classic adventure fan’s time.

With its lighter tone and smaller scale, The Last Crown: Midnight Horror is a nice little snack for fans of the first game before the next main course.

Tales of Cosmos is an adventure in the classic mould, putting puzzles before story, having fun before making much sense, and ideas before polish. Whether that’s refreshing or just old-fashioned is up to you.

Still There’s elaborate puzzles and willfully obscure explanations may scare off casual players, but stick with this meditative adventure and you’ll find much to enjoy within its thoughtful depiction of a lonely life in space.

The Long Gate offers a unique and beautiful way to learn electronics, and it’s still evolving, but in its current state it’s likely to be a confusing slog for many.

The puzzles were generally easy enough to keep me moving, but the linearity did generate some frustration along the way, and the excessive backtracking, difficult navigation in some areas, lackluster story presentation and Carol’s subdued presence all resulted in an underwhelming experience.

The lovely Lost Words has some interesting ideas and presents a well-written, authentic tale of a young girl’s grief, but uninspired platforming drags the experience down.

Perhaps better suited as a jumping-off point for newcomers than existing fans, Dog Mendonça and Pizza Boy is a perfectly serviceable game in its own right but falls just short of the mark set by the graphic novels.

It creates a great atmosphere, but the overall Homesick experience ultimately feels a bit threadbare.

Asking players to delve deeply into its philosophical underpinnings but too easy to make the actual gameplay particularly fun, The Charnel House Trilogy is an uneven yet oddly compelling ride.

Although it remains a formula with tremendous potential, this is one experiment that needs to go back to the drawing board.

999 is a gutsy, mature story that blends horror, science, and character-driven drama in intriguing, thoughtful ways. It's also backed by some sparse but solid gameplay, melding traditional puzzle types with a cohesive math-based theme that nicely suits its subject matter. Unfortunately, what could have been a taut psychological thriller all too often becomes a plodding, pace-killing narrative full of bloated, poorly-integrated dialogue.

Trails and Traces is an easy, modestly designed but enjoyable little comedy about pirates, detectives and megaphones, but it ends before it’s able to fully find its footing.

While not spectacular as a game in and of itself, the gameplay innovations it presents to the adventure genre might make it worth a try.

The deliberate pace and excessive reading will surely limit its appeal, but for high-fantasy fans, the rich game world, solid storyline, varied puzzles and exceptional background art make Eselmir and the five magical gifts worth being patient to see through to the end.

CastleAbra is a whimsical romp through old-fashioned fantasy environments that will amuse gamers who can embrace its retro sensibility, zany scenarios, and tough inventory puzzles.

Bigger fans will probably get a kick out of visiting Emily's world, particularly those who haven't played games like this before. For the rest of us, there are better puzzle games out there to choose from.

The Lost City is a swift, undemanding adventure that chooses to parade as relaxed mobile entertainment, rather than capitalizing on its potential to be a more memorable adventure gaming experience.

All in all, with such an intriguing premise and strong production values, the developers had the foundation to make a great game, but the corny plot, pretentious writing, uninteresting characters, and some questionable design issues prevent it from achieving its full potential.

Lost At Sea takes on a bold concept, and does a serviceable job of telling its story through well-designed puzzles. That said, many other parts of the game feel underdeveloped, and while still a memorable experience, a bit more expansion could have made it unforgettable.

It’s a murder mystery with a twist everyone will see coming from a mile away, and the puzzles and slowness don’t do it any service. This could have been a classic.

More than a little buggy, easy to finish, and short on characterization, The Way of Love: Sub Zero is a rather empty-feeling adventure offset just enough by its premise and backdrop to give it a quaint bit of charm.

Though let down by weak gameplay, Read Only Memories is one of the most human games available this year, which is remarkable for a cyberpunk game dealing with robots and transhumanism.

Event[0] is an atmospheric, tense sci-fi yarn that ends too quickly and never lives up to the potential of its innovative core mechanic.

Lust from Beyond tells a thoughtful, albeit unapologetically disturbing, story. Its puzzles won’t leave you stumped for long, its action and stealth aren’t particularly engaging, and a number of technical issues are sure to cause frustration, but if you have a strong stomach for this particular brand of erotic horror, the excellent world-building and grotesque imagery will reward those who see it through.

To those who don't find timed sequences a game killer, the original story, unique locale, and ever-charming Alan Parker Cameron help make the game a memorable, though slightly tarnished, experience.

Eclipse: Edge of Light makes the most out of its humble mobile beginnings, making exploration visually and aurally entertaining. Deeper gameplay and a bigger focus on narrative would have pushed the game to the next level, but being able to ride a jetpack for a few hours is a winning mechanic right from the start.

Stories Untold is better than the sum of its parts, even if this collection of horror-themed interactive fiction vignettes never quite capitalizes on the potential of its concept.

As it stands, Red Johnson's Chronicles feels more like a showcase of style over substance: a demonstration that more adventure games can be made on the PS3 with QTEs and popular CSI-style investigations.

Evil Pumpkin’s tricks and treats are about evenly doled out in this quirky casual entry in a wonderfully imaginative Halloween world.

Treasure Island isn’t as good as the source material that inspired it, but offers enough pleasant discoveries that pirate fans should find worth the journey.

Alternate Jake Hunter: DAEDALUS – The Awakening of Golden Jazz is a visual novel-adventure aimed at gamers who delight in plot twists and dialogs and are willing to overlook repetition and graphical discrepancies.

It’s a bummer that a game that looks as good, and is as well-designed and polished as Alum, misses the boat on story so badly.

As a point-and-click experience in spirit, Psychonauts in the Rhombus of Ruin is much better suited to hardcore adventure gamers than its sometimes demanding platforming predecessor ever was, but it isn’t a standout game in terms of enjoyment or quality. It’s a short side mission that doesn’t wow with its puzzles or offer anything revolutionary in terms of gameplay or narrative. But it accomplishes what it sets out to do, by bringing a sorely-needed new dose of Psychonauts to the faithful, or at least those with a PlayStation 4 and a PSVR headset. It neither particularly delights nor disappoints, but marks its place as a competent placeholder in the expanding Psychonauts series, and a reasonable point of entry for those new to the virtual reality experience.

Fire fits perfectly into Daedalic’s stable of fantastical worlds inhabited by colorful protagonists, but as a fairly casual puzzler it likely won’t entice the hardboiled adventurer with its extreme linearity and low challenge.

CYPHER's attempt to modernize the classic text adventure has a lot of interesting ideas, but the lack of polish on the text itself keeps the game from living up to its potential.

The graphics and interface are vastly improved and the puzzles more organically connected to the game world; the game as a whole is far more compelling.

A Case of Distrust is a stylish and solid mystery adventure, but with no chance to solve it yourself, you may be left wondering what your role in this game actually is.

Draugen offers plenty of shocks and chills set against a unique, scenic backdrop of rural Norway, but is sadly let down by some jarring dialogue and a confusing conclusion.

Without question, Rakuen is an ambitious indie endeavor and I admired many aspects of it—the Boy’s authentic child-like wonder in the face of real human tragedy, the funny and endearing inhabitants of Morizora Forest, and the mystery surrounding the Boy’s hospital stay, to name a few. But my dissatisfaction with the puzzles and ending make the game difficult to wholeheartedly recommend. It really comes down to what kind of game you’re in the mood for. If you want a game that’s mostly story, then the number and type of puzzles in Rakuen will likely turn you off. If you’re looking for more of a story-puzzle balance regardless of how well the two are integrated, you’ll probably have a better time with Rakuen than I did. And if you’re in the mood for a game to make you cry—well, this one will, I guarantee it. I just can’t promise it’ll be the catharsis you’re looking for.

While The Haunting of Castle Malloy poses a genuine challenge that will take even experienced gamers between 10-15 hours, the unbalanced difficulty of the puzzles and mini-games combined with an uninteresting bunch of characters and locations results in one of the lesser Nancy Drew games on the market.

With a fun off-screen companion and an interesting story to delve into based on real-world concerns, The Bradwell Conspiracy is a fairly enjoyable experience even if a weak ending and an assortment of glitches hold it back from its full potential.

Whimsical visuals, charming characters, and a wide assortment of activities are weighed down by clunky controls in the one- or two-player co-op adventure 39 Days to Mars.

Woodhill Interactive’s Orten Was The Case is a good game, but has a few noticeable flaws. On the one hand, the narrative itself is incredible, and the deeper you dive, the more enticing it becomes. There are evident issues with the gameplay and presentation, but patient players can push through or adapt to them. Those looking for an absorbing tale will find much to admire in this game.

While still an enjoyable experience, The Last Resort fails to live up to its potential, and is more of an "Average Outing" than a Grand Adventure.

Most necessary elements of a winning formula are in place, but Violett desperately needs a story to bind the disparate parts together into a classic experience.

Damn Virgins is more of an uneven frat house comedy than apocalyptic blockbuster, but its heart is in the right place and its puzzle foundations are sound.

Despite a few narrative stumbles en route, Stairs is a short but effective scarer wrapped in some very pretty packaging.

A wild ride full of bizarre anecdotes, cryptic characters and gorgeous drives, Hitchhiker – A Mystery Game offers up more than the average road trip, though the dense dialogue and the finale’s sudden ending prevent it from reaching top gear.

While not flawless and more focused on narrative than puzzles, SIMULACRA manages to be a fun experience by offering more player agency than its lost phone contemporaries, throwing players into an ongoing missing persons investigation – with a supernatural twist.

Another Lost Phone doesn’t look like much and its linearity ensures a short play time, but it has enough gameplay and story depth with important themes to be a pleasant experience while it lasts.

Working together with a partner to overcome obstacles is a great core concept at the heart of We Were Here Too, though as a castle escape game it isn’t particularly noteworthy beyond that.

It’s got far more beauty than brains, but for gamers who appreciate a macabre atmosphere and distinctive art style, Tormentum could be just the brief but darkly beautiful diversion they’re looking for.