By the makers of Myst, FWIW

I bought it a while back. Played it. Looks good but it lacks something. Dunno what but I simply couldn't get engrossed in it, which meant some of it was boring and I began to forget what was what (and where) and what I was supposed to be doing, which made it more frustrating. Could well be fabulous using a VR set-up but that's a bit of a hefty investment to prove a theory. 

I used to enjoy adventure games. Liked all the Mysts, except the last one. Liked the Zork graphical games too. Maybe I'll wipe my progress out on this and give it another go.

Edit: Oh, and don't download it for casual play on a laptop unless it's a decent spec. It needs an i5 2500 and Geforce 660 GTX (1GB tbh) or equivalent, minimum.

Have you played The Talos Principle? It's essentially a puzzle game set within a larger adventure framework, with clever game mechanics, a balanced learning curve and more than a dash of Sophie's World stylee potted philosophy with an emphasis on human/AI/free will.

If you have the kit, it's even better played in VR, though I played it through flat the first time with great pleasure.

I know the name from somewhere and when I looked online it was familiar(ish) but I've never played it. On the basis of your recommendation I shall have a go.

I played "Forgotten", a myst-like 3D-immersive puzzle game ~20-years ago that I quite enjoyed on an original model powermac. The 3d environments were varied and beautiful, some of the puzzles were really difficult but satisfying to (eventually) solve, the complete lack of any characters was unnerving. And it was buggy AF.

It was coded in mTropolis, an interesting potential competitor to Macromedia Director, who promptly bought out and killed it (I used it for a couple of projects, it was pretty slick but again, buggy AF, slightly moreso than Director). Also, it had a cool, cutting-edge interface where Director could charitably be called dowdy.

I might go ahead and install this free Obduction thing for the eye candy and nostalgia angle, if I'm really bored.

Spun this up last night for ~5-minutes. There are some potentially interesting ideas, eye candy isn't really up to scratch, voice-over story exposition low-budget schlocky. I'll see if it gets better.

Can you play the free GoG version in VR?

I was wondering that. All seems a bit vague, but apparently, yes. I bought it a while back but I assume the free version is identical. When I go to the GOG Galaxy start menu there's a Play button and a More button. More lists "Obduction VR" and the game starts on my PC when I click the link. 

Oohh, cool. I'm not VRd up yet but I have reserved a Valve Index. I look forward to trying this out. I haven't tried the 2D game yet.

It's a bespoke VR release. I did get a reduction in the price of the VR game for owning the flat version - I don't know whether that would apply with the free GoG version. I suspect not.

Are we at cross-purposes here? 

I notice that Chrisss was asking Manthorp - who had just posted about the Talos Principle, whereas I replied (in error?) about Obduction.

AFAIK there is no free version of the Talos Principle, short of asking Jim for it. And I'm pretty sure GOG doesn't have it anyway unless it's ferreted away somewhere where their search won't reach. I hope that's right, because I just shelled out to buy it on Steam.

Ah!

My mistake, firstly in introducing the Talos Principle where it had no place to be; and then to implicitly agree, without checking, that there was a GoG free distro of it (though by the sound of it, Chrissss's mistake, too, for conflating the two in the first place).

We may need to rewrite teh code to compensate for dwindling intellectual capabilities as we enter our sunset years...

Oh, ah, yeah looks like that was my fault confusing everyone. Including myself.

Teh Olds Forum

"dwindling intellectual capabilities"

Mine are in the same dismal ballpark as when very young. Old age? Bah.

I no longer have a memory, just a digital calendar.

I can't remember to look at the calendar.

(I can see where this could become an old age bathos pissing match...)

The only way I could win a pissing match would be to throw my pad at you...

OK, let me go find my reading glasses.

I'd never remember anything these days if I didn't set Google reminders.