Hollow Lantern

Hollow Lantern is a moody little adventure that leans on atmosphere more than difficulty. You wander a drawn-by-hand town looking for the reason every lamp has gone dark, tapping to examine things, combining items, and slowly piecing together what happened here.

The puzzles are fair — nothing requires a walkthrough if you actually read the clues. We appreciated that it never asked us to go online; the whole story sits on the phone and plays the same in a tunnel as it does at home. It's maybe four hours long, which felt exactly right.

The art is the real draw. Every room looks like a page from a sketchbook, and the sound design makes the empty streets feel lived-in and lonely at once. A quiet, melancholy gem worth playing with headphones.

What we liked

• Gorgeous hand-drawn art in every scene
• Fair puzzles with no hunt for hints
• Short, complete and fully offline