Hidden (Object) Desires

You're overwhelmed by life. It's been a rough week. You're feeling listless. You're lost and tired. You are super bored. Your squished brain cannot process complicated things. You need to de-stress from distress. How do you find respite from the eternal avalanche of life things? Well, if you're anything at all like me, that question is much better expressed as: "What is the game that will fix you up again?" 

Games are therapy for me as much as fun. When the main symptom is overwhelm I find most of my games library will make things worse. FPS? My eyes! My eyes! RTS? I can't strategize right now, man! Narrative-driv… bleurgh! 

I just want something to autopilot the next hour of my life by hijacking a dopamine loop and zoning out. So I find myself playing… 

Mystery Case Files! Hoora- Wait, what? 

I caught myself playing it red-handed this week to be honest. Like walking in on an enthusiastic teenager mid, erm, enthusing. Only it was me, walking in on myself and… no that metaphor is going wrong. Anyway, as if hijacked by a primal urge I had scrolled through the first games library app I could get my hands on. Installed and launched the never played MCF: Moths to a Flame and had already acquired three items entirely  on automatic before really understanding why. I had sought instant solace in the familiar rote of finding hidden objects and using them to solve puzzles. Blissful, tranquil, calming, puzzles.  

"But puzzles aren't mindless uncomplicated restful things Jono!" I certainly don't hear you cry in my head… I'll still answer you though. Just with a brief and convoluted aside. You know I love those. 

As a young child, pre-internet, I remember a lot of idle boredom. Much more than my kids have ever experienced. There were no iPads or Laptops to zone out to and Saturday morning cartoons would actually stop showing. If I was staying with my Dad I might have had chance to play on the Commodore 64 - rafting in Park Patrol - but that was always short lived. 

Mostly it was just me and the endless void of free time at home. I'd try to fill it. I would  imagine the hell out of spaceships and zombies and dinosaurs and stuff them into an infinite daydream wormhole. Alas, the void remained. It was fun - but there's only so much the brain ship can take, captain!

I found puzzles to be a great boredom filler. Usborne Puzzle Adventures from the library, loaned after weeks of eagerly waiting. Maybe if I was lucky there would be a Quiz Kids magazine. Back when you would actually go to the newsagents and ask the owners to reserve your subs.  In truly desperate circumstances I'd ask my parents to write maths questions on a piece of paper and eagerly run to my den to solve them. I was definitely that kid.

Over time that would develop into my deep love for Point and Click, and I guess more recently, Thinky Games as a whole genre. More importantly though there's a level of puzzle solving that becomes second nature over a lifetime. Just as a Rubik's speed-cuber idly picks up their quadrangular rainbow conundrum and returns it to conformity without thinking too much about it. The stressful challenge of solving doesn't exist because the solutions are learned from years of spotting patterns and generating common solutions. In a way you just flow through the motions and let your mind wander the solutions. 

Flow is the therapeutic part

In Mystery Case Files you are a Master Detective, working on a case that is usually a bit odd. Mysterious manor houses, plundering pirates, creepy carnivals. (Pick a trope, any trope. Step right up.  Everyone's a winner!)

Solving the case involves looking at static scenes for things to interact with. Sometimes that is collecting an item, sometimes it's an interactive puzzle, often it's a Hidden Object Scene. Oooh. HOSs as they're called in the biz, are like Where's Wally\Waldo except all the Wallys are objects to find in scenes relevant to the greater mystery and you don't go stripe-blind. Jewellery on dressers or leaves in woodlands. That kind of thing. It's visual wordsearch essentially. Though developers will often have fun with mechanics. A recent favourite involved finding stained glass shards to rebuild a window. Sometimes you only get the shape.

The characters are weirdly uncanny and I feel are often photoshops or traces of real people? I wonder if they get them from stock or invite models in. Maybe just the nearest face-that-fits from the office. How do they feel about being immortalized as these creepy caricature?  There's often huge effort on theming too and elaborate plotting. Overall the stories and the dialogue are not going to win at next year's Game Awards. (This is an opinion. If you feel they're the next King, you can wave that flag too.)

I do have other options for boredom, like a decent Simulator, or a level of Creeper World 4. Maybe even a run on some daily sudoku or newspaper word puzzles but MCF is an old-reliable. They sweep you along through a tale, bit of adventure , relaxed puzzles with hints and skips. It's easy reading. It's the Mills & Boone of videogames.

Another aside for you! (How I spoil thee!)

Being bored as a child caused me to notice how my mum would usually have Mills & Boon novels scattered around the house. I think they generate some form of L-space wormholes and tunnel into sofa edges or cabinet corners. Sometimes toilet seats. (Ook!) I wondered what are these Mills? These Boons? Turned out they are mass-produced British romance novels ! Er:

And check this: 

"Modern Mills & Boon novels, over 100 of which are released each month, cover a wide range of possible romantic subgenres, varying in explicitness, setting and style, although retaining a comforting familiarity that meets reader expectations. " -Wikipedia

100 a month!  That's about as many baby lemmings as you might get in six months! They, along with a decent 1000 piece jigsaw, were my Mum's go to boredom solvers. And probably, as it was the 80s, a fag and a Nescafe instant coffee nearby. (Sorry mum. I'm over stereotyping. Let's agree we are both glad you quit smoking in the 90s though.)

 The point is, as I imagine Mum's distant frown at that unwarranted characterization, that she had a go-to boredom fixer when the more elaborate fixes were too much. A ready supply of a simple, predictable storybooks to zone out which required very little setup and could fill the empty space with a happy sigh. 

Mystery Case Files and the wider hidden object puzzle genre feels like that to me. It's very predictable, low stakes. You have seen variations of their puzzles everywhere. You go in with an understanding that this isn't a serious relationship but a casual fling. It's a wink and a smile and a kiss-me-quick arrangement. (Incidentally there is an MCF: Blackpool but I discovered it has nothing to do with the place much to my utter disappointment.) Venturing from the core MCF series, which is now at least 30 titles,  there are hundreds of similar games. There in L-space when you need them.

I don't want to undermine the work of MCF-style game developers here.  I don't know enough about 80s Mills & Boon to critique the content but I'm fairly sure there was a snobbery around their quality I don't want to endorse by analogy. Work goes in. It's enjoyable, no one has half-arsed the effort even if quality varies massively. The writers knew their audiences. People making things for people should always be celebrated regardless. The Hidden Objects games are no different and the developers know what it takes to deliver on expectations of the genre. Puzzles and HOS and Mysterious Plots are the formula.

And they are hugely popular. MCF: Ravenhearst hit the top-sellers list at one point. They really are the Mills and Boon of casual gaming. I've just finished Moths to a flame and Living Legends : The Crystal Tear and Reflections of Life: Dark Architect and I feel they each helped the brain overwhelm subside during those downtime moments.  I'll move on to more complex stuff again now, until I need to come back for a new case…