Hi everyone, and welcome back to My Week Unwrapped, where I discuss all the games I’ve been playing over the last seven days. Genshin Impact continued to take much of my time earlier in the week, but now that I’ve completed most of the summer event, I’m cutting back a bit. That allowed me more time to play through the final House of Da Vinci game, as well as some Netflix games and others. It’s been quite the busy week, so let’s not waste any more time.

The House of Da Vinci 3

Blue Brain Games released the first House of Da Vinci game five years ago as a highly ambitious Room-like, filled with all sorts of puzzles and mechanisms inspired by Leonardo da Vinci’s inventions. I was impressed by it, but mentioned in my review that it was a bit too similar to its inspiration. So I was glad to see that they did more to stand out on their own with the sequel, including the introduction of time travel as a way of solving puzzles. Now, two years after the second game released, the third and final installment of the trilogy is out and it is quite an impressive game. The House of Da Vinci 3 picks up where the previous one left off and has you, Giacomo, trying to destroy the first time machine with the help of Da Vinci himself. One of the more innovative chapters has you using a crossbow in the past to shoot at things and affect them in the present. This is quite a big game that could rake a long time to complete if you don’t use any hints. There’s also a lot of back-and-forth, which I don’t love, but I was able to overlook it due to the creative puzzles. The game really asks you to use the whole environment and it makes the world come alive. I wouldn’t have minded a way to spot interactive items, though, since it’s not always easy to tell what’s not just decoration. But overall, I’m impressed with the game and would recommend it to any adventure or puzzle fans. I’m also working a walkthrough here if you get stuck and the in-game hints aren’t enough.

NETFLIX Before Your Eyes

Before Your Eyes has been available on other platforms for a little while now, but this week Netflix brought it over to mobile as part of their subscription service. The main gimmick is that you blink to control the game. There is an option to use an alternate control scheme, but I wanted to play it the way it was intended, so I didn’t try that way. As for the blinking controls, the way it works is that you swipe the screen to search for an wye and move the cursor to it and blink to interact. That itself doesn’t feel like it benefits from the blinking. But what’s really interesting is when the metronome appears at the bottom of the screen. If you blink while that’s present, you’ll skip to the next scene even if someone’s still talking. My eyes were very dry and I sometimes blinked before I wanted to. So I didn’t hear every last word. But I found that really compelling. There were also points where the game wanted me to keep my eyes open for a certain amount of time and boy, did I struggle. Luckily it doesn’t start the timer over if you fail, so I was still able to get past those parts. The game did have some issues recognizing when my eyes were closed, though. That made it hard to progress during sections that required it. I managed, but it took a lot of messing around and was quite frustrating. But it was all worth it in the end for the story. I don’t want to spoil anything, so I’ll just say it’s about a soul reliving its life through memories before it moves on to the afterlife. If you have a Netflix subscription, I highly recommend playing this one.

Hotel Orpheus – Room 1309

Somehow I hadn’t heard of the Hotel Orpheus series before, but the newest one released recently, called Room 666. I decided to start with the first, so I played through Room 1309 so far. It reminds me a lot of the Rusty Lake games, as there’s blood everywhere and you use body parts in puzzles. I really enjoyed this one and found the puzzles all to be logical. My only gripe was that I missed an item early on because I didn’t realize I could swipe to move an object that was obscuring it. But otherwise, it’s a well-made room escape game that’s cheap and easy to recommend. I also have a walkthrough guide here if you need help.

Adventure Escape Mysteries – Mirror Man

I only just started it since it released today, but I’m thrilled to see that the latest Adventure Escape Mysteries game is a spoof of 1970’s horror movies. It’s called Mirror Man and I’ll be playing it over the next few days and updating my walkthrough as I progress.

Dungeon Munchies

Dungeon Munchies sounds great on paper, and I love the whole idea of it. Basically, it’s a dungeon-crawling platformer in which you collect parts from monsters you kill and use them in recipes to craft food or equipment. Unfortunately, I didn’t get very far because the controls made me ragequit. I was playing on my iPad and the joystick is floating, so I appreciate that. But the action and jump buttons are so minuscule that my thumb missed them more often than it hit. I kept taking so much damage because I couldn’t hit the attack button without staring at it. So at the moment, I wouldn’t recommend buying it, especially if you plan to play on a tablet. I’ll give it another chance if the controls get updated, though.

NETFLIX Mahjong Solitaire

I’ve been a fan of Mahjong Solitaire in the past, so I figured I’d give Netflix’s new game a chance while I’m still subscribed. I’m not sure if my tastes have changed or there’s something missing with this game, but I’m just not feeling it. It just seems like a time-waster. I’m especially confused by the order of the puzzles, as they cycle through one easy, medium and hard at a time. So the difficulty curve is basically nonexistent. I played through the first 15 puzzles and honestly can’t see spending any more time with it. But if you want a puzzle game that offers little challenge to keep your hands busy, I guess you could do worse.

Genshin Impact

And last, I’m still playing Genshin Impact. I completed a lot more of the Golden Apple Archipelago puzzles and finished the final Heizou hangout. There’s also an event going on right now with daily battle challenges and so far I’ve managed to get all the rewards. I’m also still deciding whether I want to try to get Yoimiya when her banner is out in a few days. MiHoYo released an official teaser of some of the upcoming Sumeru characters and I’m worried about entering version 3.0 without enough wishes saved up. I guess I have some time to think about it, though.

And that’s everything I’ve been up to this past week. I also finished season 4 of Stranger Things. It was the most bloated season yet, with the cheesiest dialogue and broken bones that heal within minutes unless that person is supposed to die. And yes, I’m looking forward to season 5 whenever it comes. I also started watching Living With Yourself and enjoying it. The premise isn’t unique, but it’s executed well and I do hope there ends up being more than just one season. Anyway, let me know in the comments section which games you’re enjoying and I’ll see you back here next time with more of My Week Unwrapped.