Quern - Undying Thoughts Reviews

Really good puzzle game. I am playing on Macintosh (M2). Quern is kind of Myst-like. You are transported to a mysterious island and you follow a series of clues and solve a series of puzzles to unlock access to new areas and new challenges to unravel a mystery. Spoken narration is well performed. Letters left by a previous visitor to the island are read aloud and a character on the island occasionally interacts with you. I have been very impressed by the depth of the environment and variety of puzzles. Every time I think I've discovered almost everything, the game surprises me with a new area and a new layer of challenge. The puzzles require keen observation and a little lateral thinking, but they so far have all had completely logical solutions. The graphics are very good the music is great and the audio design is OK. (some background noise loops are a bit repetitive). I am really enjoying my stay on Quern and I recommende it.

I really enjoyed this game, great puzzles, nice atmosphere, decent story. I didnt really like the whole pipe puzzle near the end, it didnt make any sense to me and i had to look at walkthrough. The ending options is pretty meh too, basically only gives you on different line of dialog and thats it. Which is a shame, i expected a bit better ending, but that said i didnt play it that much for story but more for the experience and cool puzzle. So deffinitely worth playing through.

i liked it at first. then it got to be irritating. the visual is not a clear as i would like it to be so i missed a lot of items or areas because it is too dark. went to youtube to watch a walkthrough and theirs is so much clearer. so i ended up quitting since in some areas i could see where things were. maybe it is my computer screen will look into this and maybe change my review

I didn't ultimately like this game tbh, only finished it to get my moneys worth and because I'm stubborn like that! I would recommend the remakes of Myst and Riven instead if you're looking for this kind of experience.

This is a game that takes a lot of time. The soundtrack is just my sort of thing (also available to buy / stream). People say that it's like Myst, but that's not a game I have played. It's also mentioned in the same breath as Blue Prince. The puzzles are tricky, but not impossible. The game is old enough that you can rely on walkthroughs if you need to. I didn't get any hints from anyone (brag). Some puzzles rely on reading, and some on music, which will be a problem if you have low vision (me) or are completely tonedeaf. I found it really engaging. The "plot" was a bit nebulous, but the vibe was excellent.

If you loved Myst, you have to try this game! None of the puzzles are impossible, however a few do need a good ear for tones and color vision. That said, I still needed to get hints from online myself. If you get frustrated, don't forget to read the letters the professor left for you.

I have loved puzzle games since Myst was first released. I have played many and enjoyed them all. I enjoyed many aspects of this game, especially the sound and appearance, but overall found quite a few of the challenges to be opaque and had to rely on walkthroughs to progress. This has happened with other games but the distinction is with the others I would end up saying, "Oh, I should have seen that!" Not so with this game. Often I would find myself saying, "How is someone supposed to figure that out?" A couple of the challenges were just unenjoyable. I did not end up with that feeling with other games of "well that was fun!" It was more of a "glad that's over" feeling.

Good graphics, good sound, nice layout, generally good puzzles, but see below. Navigation is a little bit hampered on a laptop using just the touchpad - which is all I have at the moment. I could see how it would work smoothly and effectively when played with a mouse, so serves me right! I was not so into the story. It neither enhanced nor diminished my desire to play. I quit playing Quern when I came to the underground "key" puzzle - the "Mastermind" puzzle. Unlike normal Mastermind, where you can use a score of 0 "hits" to determine the digits, you always get hits in this version and that makes Quern's version a LOT harder. Further, the puzzle was intentionally designed to be clumsy and difficult to operate - back-and-forth between two stations for each iteration, and the key-setting station was awkward to work. Worst of all was the significant random component which thwarted a purely rational solution. The reviews all confirmed my expectation that this puzzle would take perhaps hundreds of tries to complete - and frankly, I just didn't care that much. I recognize that a lot of good effort went into making this game, and I commend the designers and developers in general, but this puzzle was a fatal flaw which caused me to uninstall the game unfinished.

Closer to the ending, the more bland it becomes, but I feel that 2/3 of the game have true Myst vibe and totally worth playing. I recommend it.

Puzzle game is hard. Puzzles break brain. In Quern, there are a lot of great puzzles coupled with a variety of complex and multi-layered challenges, some interesting designs for puzzle layout, and some [surprising] lore. Some things that helped save my Interest in the game, was the "Interaction Helper" in the Gameplay tab of the settings. Turned on after about an hour of getting frustrated and it made a world of difference by showing a glowing effect of objects that can be interacted with. Pretty solid completionist experience, but if you're not careful with your saves, you can miss out on some achievements and have to play through again. Should take roughly a day to complete the game. Solid 7/7.