The Land Of Lamia

So this could potentially be a sweet and short puzzle game but it ends up being not-too-accessible and didn't really make me want to put my time into it. (This is one of these games I don't even remember how they got into my library but wanted to understand what's the deal with them)

Technically speaking this is not the most impressive game you'll find, even for indie titles from around a decade ago, but it's not really bad, just cheap. I did find the graphics, music, and the whole mysterious guiding-book mechanics intriguing enough to at least want to finish this and give it a try.

The thing is the controls are fairly unique and would really test your nerves.
Basically you're controlling two characters - brother and sister - you'd move them both simultaneously by using the arrow keys. So far so good.
The catch is, the sister would run fast by default. What do we do? We'd press Shift and then the brother would run faster than her.
So basically that means throughout the entire game (which consists of 3 levels you'd probably bean in half an hour IF you know what you're doing) you'll have to "balance" their distance on and on.

Looks like the puzzles are pretty much based on this mechanism and it's not completely bad, in my opinion, and I find it kind of unique and interesting.
On the first level I have actually enjoyed the challenge of figuring out what to do and get the controls right.

Second level - here you actually have to explore around the environment back and forth to understand what to do next and what's the objective exactly. Here I've quickly lost my patience, since this has stopped being fun.. When you add to the controls mechanics the weird and uncomfortable camera angles, this just makes you want to quit.
And so I did :)

Gave up on first level after fighting the controls and camera angles. Could have dealt with one or the other, but both being a problem is just too time consuming. I like a game to challenge me, not an interface.

Personally didnt like the controls of controlling both while the camera angle kept moving and just having wasd felt limiting. Maybe one ay ill get to finishing it but after owning this game for three years of not making it past the first walk, i dont know if i wanna play this again.

Not only was this game hard to play (even by my standards), it was also extremely tedious from the very beginning. I tried to give it a chance, but I just can't bring myself to open it up again.

Tim Burton visual aethetic, which is straight away a strike against it in my book.

It has one of those annoying "contol 2 people at the same time" mechanics which were all the rage in indie games a few years back. Thank Christ that bullshit died a death.

The camera is crap.

That's as far as I got, because I couldn't stand playing it any more. Just awful.

The controls are terrible and at times you can't even see where the characters are that you're trying to navigate (weird camera perspective which you can't control) - but even when you can see them they sometimes get stuck on nothing (buggy perhaps).
(Getting stuck only seems to happen to Thomas - maybe his big hands get caught on stuff? Lily has hers eternally clasped around the book so I suppose they aren't in the way...)
Also perhaps a bug: one or both of the kids kept turning to stone (in the first part of the game) even when they were clearly still on the path! Very annoying - I skipped that chapter then.

Also with so little sound/music there is no atmosphere to the game. And no voice acting, just a few lines of text displayed.
(I really don't mind the simple graphics if a game is atmospheric and entertaining in some way. Sadly this way it was just boring and frustrating.)

The book pages were nicely illustrated though. The puzzles were good too (and challenging, I had to consult a guide sometimes) but the frustration over the controls (and camera angle and bugginess) overshadowed them and I ended up only finishing the last of the three chapters.
(For that reason it's nice at least that you can play the 3 parts without having finished the previous ones.)

TL;DR: If you enjoy terribly difficult/wonky controls (only keyboard) as the main challenge in a game, then give this one a try...

Controls are brutal to master, the learning curve is incredibly high to figure out just how to control the characters. You control BOTH characters at the same time and one moves faster then the other. This is really tedious considering that you are trying to manipulate them down a narrow and twisting path and one continuously moves off the path.

A short puzzle game with a simple, but surprisingly challenging premise. The only mechanic is moving two siblings around at the same time with the same movement keys. The trick is that the siblings do not move at the same speed, requiring some nimble fingers to get them where they need to be. The atmosphere is pretty and interesting.

+ Interesting game, especially if you are into slow paced memory puzzle games +

The controls and camera angles are very frustrating. Even when you know how to solve the puzzle, it is difficult to actually accomplish it.

The art style is good, but their faces are a bit rough when the camera zooms in during cut scenes.

Couldn't say I would recommend to a friend.

Finished this game in an hour, "short story driven puzzle game" is an understatement. After trying the first puzzle several times I gave up and moved on to the next one because it relies on simply getting through the maze quickly and not stepping off the path. I enjoyed the challenge of the second and third puzzles but there is so much missing in this game. Like an ending. Like a story. Particularly when the whole game is based off of being stuck in a story book.

I loved the look of this game and you can get used to the mechanics of Lily and Thomas, but you have to figure out a lot for your own. Also this game is more like a demo than an actual game, with the player unlikely to want to repeat any of the puzzles.

Only buy this game if it is on sale (what I did) and enjoy the hour you will spend on it.

The atmosphere seems fantastic? I went into this feeling really positive, but I was kind of flabbergasted by how egregious some of the bad qualities are.

1. The controls are pretty bad. Part of that is a gameplay gimmick that I just happen not to like. You are controlling two characters with a single input. One of them walks faster than the other. The girl walks at a steady rate. The boy either walks slower than the girl or, if you press the run key, faster than the girl. A lot of the challenge (and in my opinion incredible frustration) derives from this mechanic, as you are guiding the characters over narrow paths that they aren't allowed to step off of or else you die and have to start over. This might not have been quite so bad if there were smooth controls, like the ability to move with a joystick, but you are limited to using WASD, making the character movement clunky and jagged, so the WASD controls (sorry PC master race) actually make things significantly worse instead of better in this case.

2. The camera angles can be antagonistic, especially when dealing with the above controls.

3. The above two gripes I probably could have had patience with for a while, but really the worst of all is that the game is just bad at communication. It doesn't tell you what you ARE supposed to do. It doesn't tell you what you're NOT supposed to do. You just start moving these characters and you don't know where you are moving them to or why. Then you will die and you won't understand why. Then you will die again with zero understanding why. It's kinda hard to win at a game that doesn't bother to tell you its objective or its rules.

If you like a game that says "die until you figure out what the point of me is" then have fun with this one, but it didn't take me long to go from optimistic to just plain annoyed.

this game even for its low price,its incredibly small,and not so much fun. it has some ''clever'' puzzles but thats it. i would not recomned it

It was a really cute game with a cool game mechanic of altering between having the boy run and having the girl run. While it was challenging (especially during that stupid maze, screw it all), it was really fun and I loved it. I really enjoyed the puzzles as well.
But... why.
Why did a brother and sister wake up in the middle of 'The Land of Lamia.'
Where were they trying to go.
I did find the ending kind of ominous with the robot's final job being to stop two children from going to a city called... Gile? Whatever it was, and clearly it was talking about these two children, and here they were, trotting along as happy as can be, presumably to that very city. So, I liked that little ominous feel at the end, buuut...
Why.
I don't know anything about these kids except that Lilly likes to shout "THOMAS" when one of them wanders too far away.
It feels very incomplete.
Also, at the beginning of one chapter (2nd one, I believe), in the little picture book, there was an ominous figure in the background of the picture, and the game specifically called attention to that character. BUT WHY. WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHO WAS THAT DUDE, MAN?!
I loved the game. My friend and I played the game together and we both enjoyed playing it.
But as a story... it is lacking very, very much. This might be fine with some other games, but this is a game that relies heavily on a STORYBOOK to solve puzzles and to help the kids... escape? Be free? Go somewhere? It relies on a storybook, but it has no tangible story as of yet that makes me feel anything except confusion.
So... right now... I give this game a positive review as it is a good game.
But if you're looking for a well-composed story...
Nuuuuuuu. = u=

I'm so torn for this game. I want to say that it is interesting, but the control system keeps me from truley enjoying it.

Me and my brother have a little lets play channel were we check the game out, go ahead and give our video a watch before you decied to buy it.

https://youtu.be/0A0WnDF37pw

The game just doesn't feel rewarding enough to justify the frustrating controls. Upon finishing a puzzle I'm more apt to say "bleh, glad I don't have to do that again" rather than, "wow, I wonder how I can do that better next time!" In other words, it's not fun at all.

first i have to say this game doesn't have much levels and puzzles YET! but i played this game with a lot of fun. sometimes it was very difficult to play both charakters at the same time but it is a challenge for itself. i really love this game and i will wait for more levels to come.
The atmosphere of the game is fantastic. it pulls you right into the best mood to play this beautiful game. the artwork is fantastic and it is diffrent from other indie games which is awesome and very unique.
it was a very nice experience to play this game and i can't wait for more :)

interesting game, nice if you want a quaint slow paced memory puzzle game, not my cup of tea

This game is a truly original work of art in an age of pastiche content and deceptive marketing. The developer has only completed the beginning of the story, which takes about an hour to play through, but it already has the makings of a great game. If you were waiting for Steam to give you something new and interesting, or maybe you remember the times when games were not designed by "borrowing" pieces of existing games and pasting them together, play LAND OF LAMIA.

This game is EXTREMELY short. The camera angles are buggy and the puzzles are not complicated. This does not feel or look like a finished product at all but supposedly it is. Did not care for it at all.