First Impression of Verne: The Shape of Fantasy

There are many of us who looked to literature for an escape when we were younger. Others may only read to satisfy the occasional English teacher. This game, Verne: the Shape of Fantasy, brings some of our favorite elements from Jules Verne’s stories to our computer screens in this beautifully elaborate 8-bit puzzle game. There is so much to appreciate about this game and I am honored to have discovered it and get to talk to you reader about it today. We only played a demo currently available on Steam, so we are drawing on what is available to us, but excitedly looking to the release of this game sometime this year.

Coming from the Spanish-Colombian studio Gametopia, Verne follows the story of Jules Verne in an adventure into Hemera, a “fantasy world from his imagination”. While we, as Jules Verne, explore this mysterious land we must solve puzzles to discover the mysteries of the fabled city of Atlantis. This puzzle point and click are also set up in a platformer-style gameplay adding to the nostalgia of the memories this game will unlock. 

After playing the demo on steam, I could not get enough of what the game had to offer. I wanted to keep exploring and wanted to keep searching for answers. I was left with so many questions: how did Jules get there? How can he be in his stories and have no memory of writing them? Is he dreaming? What does the nautilus look like? What does Atlantis look like? So many unanswered questions and too long a wait to find the answers. The puzzles were fun and elaborate and reminded me of all the other puzzle games I grew up playing as a kid.

For now, dear reader, we keep a close eye on this game and occasionally play the demo repeatedly. This game has incredible potential to be one of the top story-telling games in the indie 8-bit world and has caught the attention of our friends and team.