Next Fest 25|2 Day 5

Did you know that Puzzle is the most popular genre this Next Fest? As such, I decided to have a day dedicated to puzzles and only puzzles, and that day is today

Highlights: Chronoquartz, Memory's Reach

Chronoquartz

Chronoquartz on Steam

In Chronoquartz, every move matters! You have 10 turns per loop: explore, solve puzzles, and use your past knowledge to progress. Strategy, critical thinking, and time management will be your allies in this unique temporal adventure. Will you succeed in saving time?

STEAM

A metroidbrania in disguise. Chronoquartz's main method of puzzle solving is you learning about how the world operates, where there are secret passages, and how to deal with enemies; all while you're stuck in a 10-screen time-loop. I really enjoyed their execution of the concept, and I'm sure they'll figure out many ways to make the 10 moves count

Prism Shift

Prism Shift on Steam

A minimalist, grid-based puzzle game where you merge colored blocks using additive color mixing. Clear connected blocks and interact with special blocks to progress through each level.

STEAM

A game about moving colors around to either remove them from the grid (match3 rules) or put specific colors on specific tiles. Overall fine, and the puzzles have the signature "trick you into making a wrong move", but they are otherwise straightforward and lack a very much needed undo button

Chromatic Conundrum

Chromatic Conundrum on Steam

Chromatic Conundrum is a first person puzzle game where you manipulate light. Combine different colors and form shadows to illuminate your way through an enigmatic world.

STEAM

Manipulate differently-colored spotlights to activate switches and solve puzzles. Simple premise that's well executed. Sadly, the puzzles are also quite simple and there are not a lot of them, so it's hard to judge the game on its puzzling valor.

Roach Post

Roach Post on Steam

Roach Post is a roguelike puzzle game where you place polyomino stamps to teleport packages. Combine shapes, colors, and roach worker effects, build your deck, gather power — and make sure every delivery gets through!

STEAM

Roach Post lured me in thinking it'll be a puzzler about fitting oddly-shaped stamps together, with some roguelike repetition sprinkled in. Turns out the roguelike bit is more like balatrolike, and a quite complex one at that. However, as many others, it falls short of glory by the fact that it's unfinished. Because of the missing explanations, polish, and VFX/SFX; it lacks what makes Balatro great. And shame, because underneath there is some good ideas and I could see this being fun, but it needs to be more satisfying which it currently isn't.

PANIK

PANIK on Steam

PANIK is a puzzle game where you have to guide different characters to the goal. But remember: Don’t panic!

STEAM

A straightforward grid-based puzzler about guiding "panikers" to the goal tiles. Problem is that they're often too panicked to move, and you have to figure out how to arrange them on the board so that they're able to move when you need them to. Add to that many paniker variants and a limited number of moves, and you have a very clean and effective puzzling experience

Cadence

Cadence on Steam

Solve Problems. Make Music. Feel Nourished. Cadence is a minimalist puzzle game about solving circuits to create music. This is not a rhythm game, but a zen music sandbox that rewards curiosity and problem solving.

STEAM

A musical puzzler, where as you solve the level it turns into an arrangement of notes, often with a loop that keeps the music going. It's satisfying, but the levels would have to be a lot more complicated for the note sequences to turn into musical symphonies, and at that point the puzzling portion of the game might suffer. Neat nonetheless

Memory's Reach

Memory’s Reach on Steam

Memory’s Reach is a first person puzzle-adventure metroidvania. Explore labyrinthian megastructures, solve mind-bending puzzles, and wield fantastic alien technology in a quest to reveal the legacy of a doomed civilization.

STEAM

A vast puzzle game based on exploring an alien planet full of hi-tech megastructures filled with a good balance of exploration, exposition, and experimentation with the mechanics. I think it does a good job at teasing things and introducing them slowly with near to no tutorials. Would be flawless had it not been for the game causing my GPU to go full oven mode. The performance was perfectly fine, but it might've been because of my decent rig and not because the game has been optimized