Lantern and Key
Lantern and Key is a quiet, gorgeous adventure that unfolds inside a crumbling coastal lighthouse. You explore room by room, solving environmental puzzles, reading scattered letters, and slowly piecing together what happened to the keeper who lived there. Everything is hand-drawn with a watercolor softness that made me stop just to look.
The puzzles lean toward logic and observation rather than obscure moon-logic, so I rarely felt stuck for the wrong reasons. When I did get stuck, the game offered a gentle hint system that nudges without spoiling. It respects your intelligence.
It's short — maybe three or four hours — but every minute is deliberate. This is the kind of game you play with headphones on, late at night, letting the atmosphere wash over you. Easily one of my favorites this year.
What we liked
- Stunning hand-drawn art
- Fair, satisfying puzzles
- Rich, melancholy atmosphere