Lucid Dream is a point ‘n’ click adventure from Dali Games Studios. It tells the story of Lucy, a paraplegic little girl, trapped in a wheelchair with her mother still suffering from the loss of Lucy’s father. Lucy embarks on a dreamlike quest across some weird and wonderful landscapes in order to help save her mother. We took a wonder through the phantasmagorical world of Lucid Dream.
A point ‘n’ click adventure is really sold on the story that is contained within the game. The tale behind Lucid Dream is well written and the heart of the story does shine through. The emotions and storyline are played out through very little in the way of actual conversation and text. There isn’t a great deal of people to talk to in the dreamworld, yet what there is often poignant and hells fill out the rather sombre tale. As Lucy dreams, she escapes the confines of her wheelchair and is able to walk again.
The game itself is a fairly standard point ‘n’ click adventure. You use the mouse to move Lucy throughout the various landscapes, while the mouse buttons tell Lucy to pick up and/or use items, talk to characters etc. There are different difficulty levels, which depending on the difficulty chosen will give you the ability to highlight interactable objects and dictate how many hints you get. There isn’t anything special about the gameplay, but is this a bad thing? After all point ‘n’ click adventure game players are not necessarily playing the game for innovative gameplay gimmicks.
There is a hand-drawn style to the game, that reminds me of the cover to the Smashing Pumpkins album, Mellon collie and the Infinite Sadness. A kind of Victoriana cartooniness, that gels brilliantly with the tone and story of the game. In no way will the graphics knock your proverbial socks off, but they are exactly what’s needed. The music and sound work in a similar way, small melancholic tunes and sounds carry you through the various dream-like stages. Never dominating, the music mixes both sadness and hope together in a delightful way.
In regards to the puzzles, even without the glowing interaction points, there are often not enough choices in interactions to mean you’ll be stumped on a puzzle for too long. Of course, whether this is a good or a bad thing depends entirely on who difficult you like your puzzle games. The dream-like quality of the stages allows a more surreal approach to problem creation. For example one problem, needs you to collect cloud tears in a bucket.
Lucid Dream is available through Steam for around £15.
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Jim Franklin
Jim Franklin is a freelance writer, living in Derby UK with his wife and his player 3. When time allows he likes nothing more than losing himself in a multi-hour gaming session. He likes most games and will play anything but prefers MMO's, and sandbox RPG's.
