The Sailor's Dream review (iPad): Lost at sea

Release Date: November 6 (worldwide)
Platforms available on: iPhone, iPad
Developer: Simogo
Publisher: Simogo
Genre: Adventure

In 2013, Simogo could do no wrong.

Between the Swedish studio's one-two punch of Year Walk and Device 6, Simogo was pushing the boundaries for game narrative and presentation by capitalising on the strengths of iOS devices.

The Sailor's Dream represents a maturation of the experimental narrative style in Simogo's last two games, which it turns out is both a blessing and a curse.

Players begin in the middle of an ocean, surrounded by dream-like islands to explore.

Navigating each island is a blend of Simogo's past talents, as you simply swipe on the screen to follow a dotted path to the next room and find that room depicted with a gorgeous painted background.

Puzzles are practically non-existent in The Sailor's Dream, or at least there are no puzzles in the traditional sense.

Despite its dream-like setting The Sailor's Dream tells a rather grounded and somber story for its characters, leaving behind more fantastical genres like horror and mystery for an intimate and personal tale.

There are a few specific patterns players need to follow in order to unlock the story's true ending, but the game makes no secret of how those patterns work so there really isn't much of a puzzle for players to solve.

Instead, your focus in exploring each island is to soak in the atmosphere and uncover various artefacts, which trigger short text stories illuminating more of the game's characters and plot.

Piecing these disparate short stories together in your head is the closest thing you will find to a traditional puzzle.

The Sailor's Dream is a maturation for Simogo in design, but also in the subject matter of its story.

Despite its dream-like setting The Sailor's Dream tells a rather grounded and somber story for its characters, leaving behind more fantastical genres like horror and mystery for an intimate and personal tale.

However, the story also represents the largest drawback in The Sailor's Dream.

As the credits rolled, the overwhelming feeling was that of an insubstantial or unfinished plot.

The story never reaches what could be considered a satisfying conclusion. This is partly by design, since the way players are expected to piece together the plot leaves it rather open to interpretation.

That openness, however, is coupled with some fairly ambiguous design elements that hint at a deeper story without actually hinting at what that story might be.

Puzzles are practically non-existent in The Sailor's Dream, or at least there are no puzzles in the traditional sense.

The most prominent example comes from interactive musical toys, for lack of a better term, which can be found sprinkled across each island but serve no readily apparent purpose.

It is possible that these diversionary instruments hold the secret to some new layer of insight that redeems the rest of the plot. It certainly wouldn't be the first time Simogo hid the crux of a game's story behind a detail that at first seems arbitrary.

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However, unlike Year Walk and the secrets hidden in its reference app, such a conscious effort has been made to eliminate puzzles throughout the rest of The Sailor's Dream that such an obtuse puzzle would be entirely out of place here.

The Sailor's Dream is Simogo's most straightforward game yet, and for that it is also the studio's oddest.

The gorgeous visuals, streamlined navigation and an impressive inclusion of seven original sea shanties are extremely effective at conveying the somber tone of its story.

But when it comes to the story itself, there is a nagging sense that either a piece of the puzzle is missing or perhaps that the puzzle just wasn't as interesting as it first seemed.

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