A few hours before I'm due to see indie adventure Röki somewhere within Gamescom's cavernous halls, developer Polygon Treehouse sends a minute-long video to my phone. The clip shows the winding path to find the game on the showfloor: into the correct hall, onto the right stand, and over to a hidden meeting room. A few hours later I'm tracing that same path, pulling my phone from my pocket to consult the video again, and my tired brain thinks, 'this feels a lot like using something from my inventory to help solve a puzzle'.
Clunky opening metaphor done, I'm very happy to say Röki is a lot more fun than all of that. This gentle, Scandinavia-set fantasy is an antidote to the noise around me, even if its puzzling nature feels slightly familiar. You play as Tove, a bright bobble-hatted young girl searching for her family in a snowy word where monsters from folklore are both friend and foe. It's an adventure game through-and-through - with an inventory to fill, locked gates and doors to open, items to combine to solve puzzles - but one built so its formula never gets in the way of the story.
Much of this story lies under-wraps, the pages in Tove's journal (described by developer Polygon Treehouse as her "grail diary") hidden from view in this brief 15 minute demo. As Tove, I puff through the snow to find a troll under a bridge with a sword stuck in its back - a sword which may well be useful to jimmy the lock to a gate I need to open. Exploring a nearby house I find rope and a bear trap I can combine into a troll-saving tool, and pretty soon the gate is open.
from Eurogamer.net
