Chants of Sennaar

EDIT: after finishing the game, I want to come back and change my review. This game was often frustrating, and I would not have finished it without consulting a walkthrough. It had great momentum up until you miss something, at which point I would feel completely stuck. If you like endlessly wandering through maze-like maps searching for one random room or item you missed, then this game is a 5 star! That part was not for me. Even so, I thought it was very beautiful and often very fun game.

Such a fantastic game if you, like me, love puzzles, language, and beautiful stylized graphics. I stayed up way too late solving puzzles and deciding phrases. I especially loved how the languages were shaped by the cultures! (Scientists describing numbers, artists describing feelings, ect.) I did have to look up some answers during the last hour of gameplay because the puzzle solutions for the ending weren't apparent. I would also love for a map feature to be added! Overall an incredible game.

Absolutely loved the language deciphering and history discovering aspects. The backgrounds and music are lovely and evocative. There were only a few places I got stuck and had to look up hints. Generally, keep exploring to find the info to progress. I wish the game had a map reference or shortcut, as exploring each level can be confusing initially, then annoying when you have to walk across multiple scenes to get to your destination. Worth the money!

What an incredible game…I’m almost speechless. I can’t believe the publisher is only asking six bucks! (And thank you for the ability to check it out first!) The art and design, immaculate. Absolute brain candy. The story and how it unfolds, curious and wonderful. The language as primary puzzle component, so much fun! It’s just fantastic. And it keeps going, cohesively, interestingly. Each level has such a lovely assortment of mysteries and little puzzles. Such a creative game. Two relatively tiny improvements imo: the double-tap for the glyphs is unusually fast (on an iPhone 14) to the extent that it was frustrating. Also, a map would be out of place of course, but so much time looking if you can’t remember locations. This hasn’t unseated Inkle’s 80 Days as my favorite game (replayability), but it is right up there. Thank you!

This is a really nice game, and if the premise intrigues you, a no brainer download. You’re wandering freely through a parallel dimension type world, piecing together a strange language through visual cues. For instance, you might see someone talking and be able to infer some words from their actions. Or you might find a pictorial monument with a caption in glyphs that you can interpret from the depicted scene. If this sounds fun to you, you’ll like this game. If not, for sure give it a pass. But for those so inclined, this is a full, well produced and involving game with a magnificently artistic visual style. It winds up being longer and deeper than it first appears, so if you enjoy it up front, it’s only going to get better. For me, the puzzles took just the right amount of figuring out, always logical and fair. There is also a decent and surprisingly poignant underlying story. It’s fun and rewarding to play, and the kind of game that will stick with you long after you finish. If parsing out a language from quality clues is your kind of game, Sennaar is terrific.

I love this game, it’s so fun, beautiful and challenging. It’s almost perfect but, I find that I constantly miss important things and have to watch play throughs to actually play the game right. This is because it, at times, can be very unclear which way you are supposed to go, leading to me missing important things. Like, in the very beginning of the warriors section I missed a key thing in the very beginning but was able to keep going. But, then I got stuck and found I missed an important part. I was quite frustrated at that because I had to go back to the very beginning of that section. I love this game, I only wish it was more clear where you are supposed to go next. Maybe this is just a me thing, I still love the game and it was totally worth the cost.