While playing Lorelei and The Laser Eyes, you might wonder if any developer has taken the cliché of detective games more profoundly to heart than Simogo. The latest indie sleeper hit from the creators of Sayonara Wild Heart is a nervy full-scale puzzle mystery that seizes that concept by the throat and hurls it through the looking glass.
Point-and-click detective games are nothing new. We’ve all poked around a spooky mansion with a flashlight in some game or another. But Lorelei and The Laser Eyes takes that tired idea and leaps into the surreal. After a few hours, it’s clear this isn’t your average detective game—and you wouldn’t want it to be.
Key Details
- Developer: Simogo
- Platform: Nintendo Switch and PC
- Price: $24.99 USD
- Review Copy Provided: No
Crack the case at your own risk
In its first hour, Lorelei and The Laser Eyes presents a web of interwoven plots involving an eccentric filmmaker, a giant magenta computer in a basement, and what appears to be a religious cult of magicians. To avoid spoilers, let’s just say it’s all delightfully bizarre.
This game truly knows how to mess with your expectations. With just an invitation letter from her car’s glove compartment and a tampon, Lorelei quietly steps into Hotel Last Jehrs. Even if you want to escape this nightmare, your car is conveniently out of fuel, forcing you to venture into what feels like the lion’s den.
A game for the mind
A web of puzzles awaits you, and as you’ll soon discover, it’s the most mind-bending one you’ve ever encountered. It starts off easy: figure out the year. You open your invitation and see it says “1982” and “see you next year.” Easy. You enter “1983” into the lock, it clicks open, and the mystery of what happened at Hotel Last Jehrs begins.
Suddenly, a simple subtraction puzzle spirals into a book of twenty logical and mathematical challenges, which then evolves into a labyrinth of numbered doors, each with its own puzzle for you to solve.
The game provides you with a set of tools: An in-game calculator and an inconvenient inventory and compendium of notes.
It became clear as soon as I stepped out of my fuel-empty car that I needed a notebook. And trust me, I’m not a pen-and-paper person. I don’t usually take notes for just any game. But Lorelei and The Laser Eyes convinced me to bring my virtual world into reality with messy, yet somehow meaningful notes.
For the most part, solving puzzles rewards you with items that help you progress through others. However, there are sweet, satisfying moments where solving a puzzle triggers a cutscene that unveils your relationship with your potential captor, or a note that hints you might not be a newcomer to Hotel Last Jehrs after all. These small revelations about Lorelei and The Laser Eyes‘ story are like candy to me.
It doesn’t take long to realize that something is going on under your very nose. In this cat-and-mouse game, the roles aren’t clearly defined and Lorelei and The Laser is a mystery that won’t let you walk away with loose ends.
Yes, it’s black and white. And magenta.
The game is predominantly steeped in black-and-white, punctuated occasionally by splashes of magenta. If you’re concerned it might look dull, prepare to be surprised. Each time Lorelei enters a room, the camera angle shifts to create a cinematic feel. Once you adjust to the monochrome palette, you’ll notice the stylish touches: film projections flicker in the background, every room brims with intricate detail, and the sparing use of magenta adds a poignant accent to it all.
When it comes to sound, fans of Daniel Olsen’s work on Sayonara Wild Hearts will be pleased to know he’s back for Lorelei and The Laser Eyes‘ OST. While it’s not Charli and milkshakes or Carly and heartbreaks, it’s still a beautifully crafted collection of tracks that set the game’s ambiance perfectly. Throughout Hotel Last Jehrs, you’ll find Phonographs where you can toggle the music on or off. Music isn’t just background noise here; Lorelei and The Laser Eyes‘ theme track unexpectedly takes center stage at a pivotal moment in the story. It’s a song I’ve only heard once, yet find myself humming day after day.
The Verdict 9/10
Lorelei and The Laser Eyes spoon-feeds you its mysteries and then leaves. Confused, provoked, and flabbergasted, you seek to satiate this hunger for its intricate puzzles.
It’s not the main plot that bewilders you; instead, it’s a myriad of seemingly unconnected details: Why is there a caravan parked outside? Whose dog is this? And who in the world is Bob Hamburger, and does he even exist?
But I would argue that it’s the quest for understanding that elevates Lorelei and The Laser Eyes to greatness. Every moment wandering the corridors of Hotel Last Jehrs is filled with speculation and theorizing, with the mind constantly at work. It’s natural to seek a logical sequence to a series of events, no matter how disjointed that sequence may appear.
Lorelei and The Laser Eyes demands this from its players. It plays with you and perplexes you. It’s a vicious cycle of needing to make sense of things, and this game is defying that notion, but luring you in again with its beauty and obscurity.
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