Syberia

Feel like you're a detective at heart and ready for a surprising adventure? Syberia has got you covered!

This point and click game is about more than its fantastic graphics and tense gameplay. Indeed, the strength of point and click games lies in their storylines and puzzles, and those found in the Syberia series are particularly engrossing. The gameplay isn't very complicated: just hover your cursor over an item to want to interact with, and then click, just as if you were opening a file on your computer. The game is captivating, and even though some of the puzzles put your grey matter hard to work, it's still a far cry from some of the more obtuse games in the genre, like Myst.

The man behind Syberia, Benoît Sokal (a name that will be familiar to fans of graphic novels), became famous for Inspector Canardo and Paradise, a graphic novel released alongside the game of the same name. The illustrator has also published Artbooks containing sketches from most of his games, including this one.

Benoît Sokal, then, is a writer and illustrator, but he's also a video game designer. In his own words, he designs them as a "family adventure", like a "modern fairytale".

The story is quick off the blocks. Kate Walker has just arrived in Valadilène, a remote village in the Alps inhabited by strange machines. She has just acquired the automaton factory, the town's only factory. But her quest will lead her to the other side of the world, and immerse you, the player, in a world with a fine art aesthetic.

Proof, if any were needed, that it is indeed possible to make games that are beautiful, intelligent, and tell a real story.

This is a point and click game to play as a family, so that everyone can put their heads together to complete this classic of the genre. A real must-play if you're in the mood for a game with a story with a capital "S".

And if, like us, you really catch the bug for this fantastic game, you can continue the adventure with the graphic novels.