Phoenix Springs

A beautiful, elusive mood piece, Phoenix Springs' blend of taut dystopian detective noir and meandering surrealism is likely to frustrate as much as it intrigues.

Phoenix Springs is playable art, and I could see it fitting beautifully into a museum exhibit, especially because you could really start the game at any given point and still find it fulfilling. But unlike many other art-forward games, this one has a compelling narrative that kept me coming back each day until I reached an ending — just one version of the ending, of which I’m certain there are many. It excels at iterating on the point-and-click mystery genre, and it’s designed for ultimate replayability.

A tasteful, effortful act of poetry through an interactive interface.

I like to think that Phoenix Springs is what happens when talented people who don't work in the video game industry decide to create a video game, without knowing or following patterns and rules that we now consider axioms. Maybe it is not so, but it seems so, and it is still a good thing.

Aloof yet captivating, Phoenix Springs teases moments of brilliance within its world, but its story remains elusive, frustrating those in search of clear answers.

Phoenix Springs is a visually stunning game with a gripping atmosphere and an emotionally charged story despite being only about four hours long. Its unresolved ending comes off as pretentious, and the emotional heaviness may not sit well with everyone. If you're into art-driven narratives, Phoenix Springs is worth experiencing at least once.

Phoenix Springs offers a stunning experience. The art is wonderful, and the sound is excellent in accompanying the visuals. The hand-drawn scenery is an amazing setting that holds a strange, twisting narrative. The voice actors are an asset to the game, bringing the world more to life, and the gameplay is a great vessel with which to explore this experience. Some clues are a little less based on logic than others, although whether that is an issue or not is mostly down to personal preference.

Phoenix Springs is an intriguing adventure game with a wonderful setting which it's fun to interact with, but don't expect it to be easy.

Phoenix Springs deals with the abstract, from its twist on genre mechanics to its narrative, and I’ve never seen anything quite like it. I’ve tried to find examples to compare it to and come up short. The point-and-click genre may never be the same, and neither will I.

Despite the spectacular presentation and thought-provoking story, though, there’s a nagging sense that Phoenix Springs is just a bit too vague. The game is drenched in interesting themes—the horror of immortality, the fragility of memory, the clashing of nature and technology—and yet it never seems willing to pin any of these ideas down with specifics.