Back to Bed

This surrealist game is love at first sight. You’ll need to put that grey matter to work if you’re to stop a sleepwalker from falling into the traps that stand in his way. The dreamlike environment is inspired by the impossible perspectives of Escher and Salvador Dali. It’s a game brimming with charm that all ages will love, as long as they’re able to use a bit of logic.

Sleep disorders don’t get quite the coverage they deserve. While 16 million people in the UK suffer from insomnia, and 1.5 million from sleep apnoea, some 30,000 suffer from narcolepsy. And one of them just might be Bob, a narcoleptic who is often found sleepwalking.

He has a bothersome habit of nodding off anywhere, at any time, and takes his life in his hands every time he goes for a nocturnal adventure. Enter Bob’s subconscious, which it appears is a fan of modern art, from what it conjures up. A surrealist game world inspired by some of the greatest painters of our time, like Dali, Magritte, and Escher.

In Back to Bed, your job is to guide Bob back to a safe place... his bed! Your main concern is stopping him from falling into the void, by placing apples in his way or having him walk into a painting.

This extremely endearing 3D puzzle-game is easy to play with a controller, and comes from the Danish studio, Bedtime Digital Games, starting as a student project. And while Back to Bed may put your logic and deduction skills to the test, “Nightmare” mode tasks you with collecting keys for added difficulty. You’ll want to be wide awake for this one...