The House of Da Vinci

The House of Da Vinci is similar to the Escape Room games, a puzzle game in Point and Click style.
I greatly enjoyed it!

8/10

cool puzzles , nice graphics.. fun game if you want your brain to hurt a little bit:P

highly recommend. i've played the room 1-3, it's roughly the same formula but this is even better. normally i like to play without hints, but i've had to use several for this one, it's challenging.

Very enjoyable puzzle game with beautiful and intriguing graphics, nice background music, and most important of all, lots of great puzzles of varying complexity. I played all the Room series, and look forward now to playing the other two Da Vinci games. Note that Steam says I logged 22 hours, which for some odd reason is way off, and the game stated at the end that I spent 4.51 hours playing it. Well worth the money.

wrote a more detailed review but was trying to decide whether I'd recommend it or not, and apparently toggling between "yes" and "no" just deletes your draft review?

so: it's fine. Puzzles, graphics are pretty decent. Story is bad. Controls are just a little too finicky, which makes it hard to line things up properly like the game wants them, which is a problem because that's necessary for a lot of puzzles. Eyepiece history mechanic is actually interesting, but that's the only selling point of this game imo.

Room series is better. If you haven't played those games, go play them. If you have, and you really want something similar, honestly just look into a different genre. There are so many puzzle games out there beyond just puzzle box games. Try a puzzle platformer or a detective game. This game is fine, but it's not going to be another Room game for you.

macOS version is crap and infuriating. you spend hours trying to find something, you can't find. you restart the game and now stuff you've tried before work or appear (like the Oculus thing). first time you're asked to draw some shape but there's no shape. you restart and BOOM. shape. this goes all along the game, and with other stuff too. absolutely awful for that kind of game that is about solving puzzles.

absolutely fabulous Very Well designed Awesome Graphics

I liked this game it reminded me of the room series,The atmosphere was dark with vibrant colours and the puzzles were hard some were pretty easy,Worth the price.

The graphics are poor anyway compared to a normal virtual world. But they are also glitchy, even on my fast machine. The view does not move smoothly from place to place as you move about. Also, the volume is always at 100% when you start the game up and it insists on showing the whole "gee wow aren't we wonderful" lame graphics intro, in excruciatingly low resolution no matter what settings you have configured. So rather amateurish in my view. "The Room" is sooo much better!

For the most part, I really enjoyed this game. There were a couple puzzles that stumped me more than I'd like to admit, but otherwise the difficulty level is not too challenging. It's apparent this game took influence from games like The Room series (I cannot remember which ones specifically it uses similar mechanisms to, off the top of my head). I'm looking forward to playing through the rest of these.

bestr game ever made i havent finished it yet but i feel so smart playing this ^-^

This is an ok game. This game is very similar to the room 2 and 3 in terms of the basics of the gameplay. they even have a very similar eyepiece mechanic to that of the room. I will say that the mechanisms seem to fit the theme of the time period very well as I could actually see after things were opened were was the mechanism that was locking the thing in place. I will say that this game has a rather weak story that does not really get resolved at all by the end. I would rather play any of the Room games over this one as this game although not bad is not as good as the Room series has always been.

fun game! i enjoyed all the puzzles. i took a buncha hints on stuff i shouldnt have but thats okay. i had fun! very creative puzzles!

Nice story and puzzles. Hints could be better, but easy to find walk through videos on Youtube.

very good game and not boring. helps you to develop your creative brain

one of the best puzzle games i've played in awile

Great story and puzzles - would definitely recommend

Very cool game with very weird controls.

I originally bought this game on mobile and played for a few hours, so I went into the game knowing what I was doing for 40% of it, the game would safely last 9 hours on a fresh play through.

I really enjoyed the puzzles the game has to offer, bar 2 which I would argue are almost impossible without hints. It is important to keep everything in mind at all times as the game will prey on you forgetting that at the entrance to the area there was a place for a key which you only get on puzzle 8 of 10. I lost my way a few times but the hint system helped me get back on track mostly, though i did find it ambiguous sometimes.

I do consider it a little steep at 17 pounds (though not by much) but I believe it regularly goes on sale so definitely worth a pick up whenever it is, which is what I will be doing for 2 and 3 because it was a good time!

really fun! has a good range of interesting puzzle mechanics and designs, and the da vinci theming works really well! thoroughly enjoyed this one

Loved the game. loads of puzzles to solve in Da Vinci's house with brilliant graphics and animation

This game is very similar to The Room but for me, this one took me longer to finish as there were times I had to redo the same things two or more times. I don't know if it's a bug or if the games blocks you from certain actions until you should get there. For example, I was inspecting an object, clicked everywhere, nothing. Later on, the hint says to inspect the object and then I can move a part. My goal was to go through it without using any hints but half way through the game it was almost impossible. I still enjoyed it and highly recommend it. Can't wait to try the 2nd and 3rd.

AMAZING

Puzzles are unintuitive and clunky, some left for just being pure trial and error but with actions having to be done for each failed attempt

A very long and much less polished clone of The Room games. Despite that, it was still enjoyable.

amazing puzzles and graphics definitely worth the money

its clunky, unintuitive, and the lenses are tacked on and annoying.

Completely disappointing controls: in some moments (I remember at least three cases, which is more than enough for a 6-hour game) you have to make 5-6 mouse movements just to open the lid of another box, simply because for some reason you can’t rotate the camera in that particular scene, and the preset angle is inconvenient. No fun.

There really aren’t any genuine puzzles in the game: once you figure out where to insert the next key/lever/detail, all that’s left is to turn it, and the puzzle is solved. There were a couple of sliding puzzles with nine pieces, the most challenging ones I can remember. But often, figuring out where the next key goes is so unclear that you can only determine the solution by trying all possible options. Sometimes it even feels like the game is deliberately toying with you: for example, in the mission
next to the last, after all previous missios were completely linear, the game decides to place the final lock at the beginning of the level, without any logical lead-up.

Unfortunately, I too was deceived into thinking this was some hidden gem in the puzzle genre, inspired by that warm, soulful forbbidden manuscript aesthetic, but in reality, even $6 on sale felt like a waste.

I had a lot of fun figuring out the different puzzles throughout the game, though one or two I think need better hints as I ended up having to google what I was meant to do. For example, in the last chapter i could not figure out what to do with the box. It is clear there was a lot of hard work and love put into the game, with the soundtrack and design working really well to set the mood and vibe, without any issues of lighting or bugs.

cool

The game is similar to "The room". The first chapters were easy and intuitive to do. However, around half-way through the game, the puzzles got harder and ended up requiring a lot of help.

Nevertheless, I'd still recommend this game to whoever enjoys puzzle games!

It's a 1:1 The Room clone, but I like The Room games so I'm not complaining.

Excellent in graphics, mood and puzzles. Very few times where I got frustrated because I missed a click, but hints were adequate in order to progress. Looking forward to playing the rest of the series. A great match to The Room game series!

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Lot of frustration playing this game but it is well worth it. Many things I had to do twice or thrice before the worked. I suspect it was because it is hard to see and sometimes the rules are hard to fathom. Still I recommend this game and I am off to play the second version. I hope it is better.

the flow of this game is not as good as THE ROOM, which is clearly mimics but it is still entertaining.

The three games in this series tell one continuous story, so this is really "part 1", and the other two games are quite good. This one is pretty ropy, and without the occult conceits of The Room series the aggressively silly escape room puzzles don't make much sense. But if you get this and the other two together, you have one long casual puzzler that has some really cool moments later on as the story builds up. Recommended as a set of games. Don't get this one alone.

Where do I even start with this game... It's illogical, too many pixel peeping for hidden stuff, and often times infuriating. The story isn't even interesting, you can have an interesting story while still remaining vague. Just look at Five Night's at Freddie's and Don't Starve with their implicit yet still interesting story.

You can realistically still solve the whole game without looking at walkthroughs, but without hints? Get ready to waste your life trying to solve it by yourself. Most of the progression, especially with objects go back and forth without any rhyme or reason to it, making clues essential. I personally feel defeated when I need to use the clues, and it doesn't leave you with a good triumphant feeling when clues are constantly needed.

Not having a reset button for the mini games is just messed up. A lot of the times I got through them through pure luck and just brute forcing my way through it. Speaking of luck, more often than not I came across a combination that even after solving, I have no idea what I did right to solve it. It’s just too many guess work and not enough having to actually use your brain and logical thinking to find the solution.

In my mind, there’s only two saving graces when it comes to this game. Visually, it’s absolutely stunning. But that alone doesn’t get you very far when a player is constantly pissed off while they’re looking at all that beauty.

There is one thing that saves this game from being completely unplayable though, and that is its length. I would’ve completely lost my mind if this game were any longer than it is. The only thing that got me through until the end and actually finish this is that I don’t like having unfinished games in my library.

Before I played the game at all, I knew there was a sequel and even a third game. I planned to buy and play it too in the future but boy, playing the first one changed everything for me. I saw in the reviews that the puzzles haven’t been improved upon in the second game.

So, for a definitive conclusion, I strongly recommend to NOT get this game or any of its sequels if you like a good puzzle game. If you don’t mind getting constantly frustrated, love some good visuals, don’t care for a good challenge and can live with using walkthroughs then be my guest.

Interesting, brain puzzling and intriguing game.

I almost rage-quit a few minutes into the game, because it is so fidgety and just not working the way it is supposed to. When you have to slide a panel to the right and it does finally so after you tried it several times and - out of desperation - wobbled the mouse for several minutes in every direction - the fun goes out the window. At this point I stayed persistent, but it did not get much better. I finally gave it up. The puzzles are only sometimes logical and sometimes it just works by trial and error. I really wanted to like it, but it is one of the worst puzzle games I've played in my life.

This is a wonderful game! It is very similar to The Room but less dark. Some of the puzzles, however, were a little too difficult for me without checking the internet.

the puzzles themselves were fun to solve and not too difficult, the game looks wonderful and the sound is also good, though i didnt pay too much attention to it. I might not have bought the game for full price but if its on sale I wholeheartedly recommend buying it.

Wow, this is tough to rate fairly...
I love games like this. I completed the similar games Room 1 up to 4 even several times.
And this one started really promising!
Opening puzzle-boxes by finding hidden buttons and solving quite diversified puzzles - in addition to the nice atmosphere - great start! I immediately got into the "Room-vibes" (minus elder gods, the null and insanity :)).

But soon the experience fell apart.

1) Bugs can happen, but in a puzzle game they are really devestating. If you try to find a solution for an hour, accidently realize you can suddenly camera-clip though a floor piece and seeing the solution directly after a restart from main menu, since now objects are suddenly where they're supposed to be - not good.

2) The puzzles soon get repetitive. Sadly those with new ideas and concepts are often confusing. Don't get me wrong! Puzzles have to be hard if the game wants to challenge you.
But imho a good puzzle has to work like "rules are easy to learn, solution is hard to find"
This game fails in part one of this rule many a time.
Especially when it comes down to obligatory information you HAVE to find beforehand without any hint that there is such hidden in the first place. Due to sometimes very few possible combinations of levers / switches, you can seriously accidently brute-force some solutions before you even find the important clue to solve it the intended way.

3) While "find the hidden panel/button" is fun when you have a puzzlebox in front of you which you can systematically search for such. Sadly, In the later chapters it's sometimes countless puzzle-locations, often even seperated over multiple rooms, where important items you need to progress are seemingly randomly hidden - sometimes in places you can only interact with if you use a specific camera-angle from 1 position.
You end up with 3-5 partially solved puzzles, where for every one a piece is missing - but you don't know if it can be found already and is just hidden well or maybe not yet available.

4) If the storytelling and inner logic of the whole thing is important is probably debatable.
But it gets noticeably worse the further you get in the game.
Why does looking through a microscope and setting the optics to get a clear image magically open a drawer somewhere else? It just starts to feel completely random.

5) The hint-system is optional and can be deactivated if you don't like hints (big plus from my side!).
But if you actually try to use the hints, you soon realize that it's pointless.
Up to 4 hints are available, always for the puzzle you should do next. They are time-gated, so that you have to wait for another hint, if you are stuck. This is peculiar, but ok - i could live with that.
But imagine a puzzle with 5 levers with 6 positions each (just an example) where you need a specific hint to find the solution (what you don't know).
hint 1 is then "Try to use the levers!"
after some minutes of waiting hint 2 would be "You can really move them!"
again after some minutes hint 3 "Putting all of them in the correct position will solve the puzzle!"
No, I'm not making this up. If you're really lucky, hint 4 might actually lead you in the right direction. Eventually you wouldn't be surprised if it said "don't forget your seltbelt while driving".
Yeah, good info. Not helpful here, but thanks.


All in all I finished the game "just because", but was pretty much only annoyed during the last chapters.

I understand that it's very difficult to play-test puzzle games. You need LOTS of people, since each of them can pretty much test each puzzle only once. But here more testing and polishing could have saved a really good concept.

Starts out very fun and intuative, but the last level is mostly just infuriating and not very logical in how to move on forward

starts out a 7/10 game and ends on like a 4/10 or so

Fun point-and-click in a great renaissance setting, but it ended reeeally abruptly which kind of disappointed me.

The puzzles were a good amount of difficulty. The spinning motion kept randomly going backwards or not letting me spin at all and that was making me so annoyed though, especially in the last room with the lever on pipe #1. It also, for whatever reason would not let me pick up the last 3 pages for the achievements which irritated me too.
Otherwise, it was good.

Good concept, decent graphics and nice atmosphere. Unfortunately to solve many of the puzzles is a matter of trial and error or luck because the reasoning behind is not logical or/and linear, Unless you have a guide to walk through it you get stuck and waste time guessing and guessing. Too bad. No match with The Room series.

Got this game during the winter sale since I was curious. Tries too hard to be The Room, a much better and much more logical puzzle solving series. The puzzles skip around with no flow, and a solid quarter had me thinking, 'How was I supposed to know to do this without a hint?'. Not a terrible game, but not worth $20. Wait until its on sale if you want to play, or go play The Room 1-4 for a much more enjoyable and worthwhile experience.

A relaxing game full of interesting riddles and puzzles. No real action, but it will give your brain a workout.

The House of Da Vinci is often compared to The Room series and rightly so; the atmosphere and tone of both puzzle games are strikingly similar. That being said, The House of Da Vinci fell flat for me until the end. The same soul and charm of The Room games was just not as present in The House of Da Vinci despite clearly taking inspiration from it. Many of the puzzles weren't engaging but rather draining to complete and required a certain level of precision that didn't trigger a correct solution often even with the correct answer because of how hypersensitive the game requires the answer to be which often feels impossible with janky controls. While I enjoyed the historic details in The House of Da Vinci, if you haven't played The Room series, I would recommend that instead; but if you are craving something similar to The Room, this game is probably the closest there is out there while retaining its own interesting storyline. I haven't played the rest of The House of Da Vinci series and am hoping that controls and overall ambiance improves with later additions. 4.5/10