VR Game Review - A Fisherman's Tale

VR Game Review: A Fisherman's Tale by Innerspace VR Studio

Played with Oculus Quest 2.

A Fisherman's Tale is actually a pretty simple hidden object game and puzzle game combo. The tasks and puzzles are not hard, and it is really the VR implementation that adds an element of player engagement.

Further, unlike some VR titles, A Fisherman's Tale actually benefits a lot from VR. The freedom of 3D VR motion and perspective would actually be quite hard to do in flat monitor gaming and certainly something would be lost.

The story / concept that underlies the puzzles is also interesting and internally consistent. This again is in contrast to a lot of hidden object and puzzle games where you are presented with an assortment of objects and puzzles that are implausible for the setting and concocted soley to present the player with a puzzle.

Here, the puzzles are based on the established world physics, and you use the rules of the game world to accomplish tasks with everyday objects.

The result is a satisfying experience of solving puzzles delightful in their creative and surprising solutions.

For players who might be worried about not being able to figure things out, there's a rather smoothly integrated hint system where the narrator will prompt you with what to do after some time passes. This can be turned off in options.

As the game moves through the final scenes, a story emerges and you really need to pay attention to get the fullest emotional impact of the ending.

There's generally less than two hours of play time here, so you may feel the cost rather steep with very little replayability (puzzles once solved no longer puzzle, after all). But this is a very polished experience with excellent visuals and a delightful experience.

You can go back and replay to try for some Steam Achievements such as finding a number of hidden pearls in each scene, but we personally did not feel that would have added much, not enough to justify playing it again.

Presently A Fisherman's Tale is at a steep holiday season discount on Steam, but we recommend you instead purchase it from Humble Bundle as part of their Black Friday VR Voyager's Pack. The cost of that entire pack of eleven games, which includes A Fisherman's Tale, is less than the regular price of this title in the Steam store.