Old Man’s Journey is a “puzzle adventure” game that tells the story of an old man whose trek begins with the arrival of an undisclosed letter.  The game has a colorful art style like a beautiful storybook and a lovely soundtrack that pairs well with the emotional story, which is told through the old man’s memories that pop up throughout his journey.  The presentation in this game is quite good, and the ending nearly made me cry (if I wasn’t recording my playthrough, maybe I would have).  Unfortunately, it is the gameplay that fails to live up to the rest of the experience.

In order to help the old man traverse from place to place, you control a cursor on the screen and can change the environment by dragging the hills up and down and even changing the incline.  This is an interesting concept, and it works well enough, even with a controller (though I think playing on a touchpad or computer would be more convenient).  You can even interact with less important surroundings, like moving strings of lanterns, tapping on frogs to make them croak, or blocking the flow of water, making this game feel a bit like the educational PC games I played as a kid, where clicking on random things would often reward you with some interesting results.

Nevertheless, the aforementioned ability to drag the hills around accounts for 90% of the “puzzling”, and I really wish the gameplay had been more varied.  And even when it does occasionally change up, it can be more frustrating than anything.  I especially didn’t enjoy the handful of times I encountered sheep in my path, as I would often have a plan to get them out of the way that should have worked, only for the sheep to refuse to budge when I clicked on them.

If you’re just looking for an interactive story, Old Man’s Journey is a fine choice, I suppose, but don’t expect particularly engaging gameplay or puzzling that requires a whole lot of thought.  The game is also pretty short, lasting about 1.5-2 hours.  To make up for the short length, I was able to get it on sale for $2.49 (normally $9.99 on consoles, $7.99 on Steam, and $1.99 for the mobile version), and anyone should be able to play it, as it’s available on every modern platform.