Game: Lotus Bloom
Genre: Puzzle, Board Game, Strategy, Education
System: Nintendo Switch (also on Steam & Windows)
Developers | Publishers: Bloomside Studios | Silesia Games
Age Rating: US E | EU 3+
Price: US $2.99 | UK £2.69 | EU € 2,99
Release Date: October 7th, 2021
Review code used, with many thanks to Silesia Games
Lotus Bloom is a minimalistic puzzle game, that was originally released on Steam earlier in the year. Its been developed by Bloomside Studios and published by Silesia Games.
Minimalistic Puzzle
Lotus Bloom is essentially a draw line puzzler. By that I mean you have to draw a line to connect dots of the same colour to white prisms. The more dots connected together the longer the beam becomes. In doing so you draw a line and if you have connected all the dots correctly a beam shoots out to reach the flowers of the same colour and make them bloom.
It sounds simple, which it is, until other dots are introduced to the playing field. It is one of those games that sounds simple in premise but is hard to master. At least it has been for me!
Make the Lotus Flower Bloom
There isn’t much of a tutorial in Lotus Bloom, I guess it is not really needed since you are only drawing lines. However, after playing the first few levels of the game where the puzzle consists of only one colour of dot, the game throws you a curveball and introduces a grey dot into the puzzle without any explanation.
For some unknown reason adding a grey dot to the puzzle completely threw me and I got stuck very quickly. You see, to use the grey dots they must be charged by the colour dots or changed to a different colour. It took a while for my brain to catch on to that fact.
No Hints or Timers
Lotus Bloom is a minimalistic game in all senses of the word. There are no timers or hints so you can take as long as you like to puzzle over the solving. It is relaxing puzzling while giving you a good challenge, which is a good thing as it’s not as much fun if the game is too easy to compete.
The dots can be clicked individually to deselect them if you go wrong. But removing the first dot in a sequence doesn’t make the whole line disappear. It just removes that dot’s connection with the other dots. I found I had to experiment with the dots connecting correctly and there is a little trial and error involved in Lotus Bloom until you figure out how things work exactly.
Visuals and Controls
I like the look of the game with its clear and unfussy hand-crafted visuals. The puzzle is as front and prominent as it should be since it is a game about the puzzle. The music is relaxing to listen to and helps keep the blood pressure from rising if you get frustrated.
Lotus Bloom can be controlled by the joy-cons or the touch screen. I preferred using the joy-con controls as they seemed more accurate than my finger at pressing the dots.
Conclusion
Lotus Bloom is a simple-looking puzzle game with puzzles that offer a good challenge for any player. The only downside is there are only 48 puzzles in the game making it rather on the short side. But for the few pounds, it costs in the eShop, it won’t break the bank.
Final Verdict: I Like it 