It’s been nearly five years since Swedish indie game developers Simogo gave us Sayonara Wild Hearts, a unique and dazzling rhythm game and a unique take on a pop album that garnered a ton of acclaim and awards, appearing on many a gaming outlet’s “Best Of” lists (ours included). So naturally, a ton of eyes have been on their follow-up, Lorelei and the Laser Eyes, which sees them once again teaming up with indie publishers Annapurna Interactive. And during today’s Indie World presentation, we finally learned when we’ll be able to check out this follow-up, as the game is set for a release in almost exactly a month from now.
Curiouser and Curiouser
Ever since its unveiling,the general premise and gameplay of Lorelei and the Laser Eyes have been a bit of an enigma. But now, after checking out its latest trailer accompanying this announcement (which you can view at this link), it becomes clear that a lot of the things surrounding the game are…well still pretty much an enigma. The only snippet included concerning the game’s story is that we have a young woman being invited to participate in a mysterious project in an old European castle by some eccentric man, as well as the game having been described as a murder mystery. Needless to say, things get surreal soon, in case the creepy children, bizarre architecture, 8-bit video games and the man with a maze for a face pointing a gun at you didn’t all help make that clear (oh, plus what we have to assume are laser eyes).
Gameplay-wise, though, we can easily intuit that Lorelei and the Laser Eyes is a more traditional adventure game, with a heavy emphasis on solving puzzles, which as seen in the clip, ranging from mazes to figuring out combinations, solving logic puzzles and much more. Given what we do know of the premise, it seems closer to Simogo’s mobile game Device 6, which also featured a young woman trapped in a mysterious location, having to solve puzzles, and where there was a mystery as to just what the heck is going on. We also get some bits of dialogue options as well, hinting an an even deeper narrative as we try to solve this mystery.
Review: Sayonara Wild Hearts
Let it be known that one needs to really play Sayonora Wild Hearts to truly experience it.
Lorelei and the Laser Eyes looks impressive with its contrasting, surreal visuals and its gameplay aimed at puzzle fans, so hopefully this ends up being another hit for Simogo and Annapurna. We’ll see if that ends up being the case on May 16, when the game arrives for the PC and Switch.
