Hollow Lantern

Hollow Lantern is a mood piece first and a puzzle game second. You explore a fog-soaked coastal town tapping objects, piecing together what happened to the people who left. The art is gorgeous and the sound design does a lot of heavy lifting — I played it with headphones and it was far better for it.

Puzzles are logical rather than obtuse. Nothing here asks you to combine a rubber duck with a hairpin for no reason; everything you pick up gets used in a way that makes sense. When I got stuck it was always my own reading that was off, not the game being unfair.

It's short — maybe four hours — but it respects every minute of that. A rare mobile adventure that ends exactly when it should.

What we liked

• Beautiful hand-drawn environments
• Logical, fair puzzle design
• A story that ends at the right moment