Puzzling Places and Shores of Loci review: assembling the pieces of existence

Ah, the click: the sweet, sweet sound of the click. So welcome, so satisfying, so moreish. I’m not referring to the sound of a computer mouse, or a remote control, or any other gadget—but rather the noise created when one fragment of a disassembled universe snaplocks into another. These are the most pleasing moments in the 3D puzzle games Puzzling Places, and The Shores of Loci. Sometimes, in both experiences, I held onto a piece, right next to the spot it would clearly fit into, for several seconds, appreciating a state of pleasant anticipation: knowing this fragment would soon become part of a larger picture.

I never got into jigsaw puzzles as a recreation, though my enjoyment of these  productions made me contemplate their appeal. This appeal is fuelled by a sense of achievement, of course, matched with the appeal of a low stakes activity devoid of time pressure and dramatic impetus—which can be particularly agreeable features in a busy, stimulus-filled modern world. VR has the added appeal of placing 3D puzzles within immersive alternative environments, with audio accompanying specific parts of the diorama being assembled (as is the case in Puzzling Places) and backgrounds and animations evoking otherworldliness (as is the case in The Shores of Loci).

When compared side by side, Puzzling Places is the equivalent of a well-financed mainstream movie and The Shores of Loci a surreal indie with a smaller budget but grander ambition. The former contains lovely photorealistic models of real-world locations: for instance the Coast of Basques and Le Mont Saint Michel commune in France; the Tatev Monastery and Fortress of Amberd in Armenia; four rooms from the Hallwyl Museum in Sweden; and some smaller, more modest locations such as a kushiyaki Japanese restaurant and a Union Pacific railway car.

The latter, Puzzling Places, puts the player in a dreamy outpost of the cosmos, featuring strange alien edifices and land formations. Each environment contains a set of flat images showing different aspects of the completed diorama. These card-like displays provide a blueprint of the model being assembled, which can be consulted like a picture of a completed ordinary puzzle, indicating where aspects of the 3D model are located and assisting us in matching colours, shapes and gradients. The placement of these flat sheets also, perhaps inadvertently, highlights a profound transformation to the very nature of images: the liberated, virtualized 360 environment revolutionizing the viewing space through the complexity and vividness of spatiality. 

Instead of looking at a picture, we’re inside the picture, enveloped in the playing area. Given dimensionality and spatiality are core to life itself, it struck me, after a while of playing Puzzling Places, that the 2D puzzle has had a remarkable run over the centuries and are still strangely popular today—a recent news report about a pandemic-related spike in popularity noting that “puzzles create a sense of order and completion.”

There’s no guiding blueprints to the puzzles in Shores of Loci, resulting in more fumbling around, more grabbing of particular pieces and trying to mash them together. Which isn’t a bad thing: just a different experience, encouraging more focus on the environmental details of each piece (for instance a road, or splotch of grassy terrain) and their potential connection to another. One thing Shores of Loci has that Puzzling Places doesn’t is the sight of small, people-like beings who stroll about, on the connected pieces you’ve assembled, occupied by the minutia of their own existence. Watching them is a delight, and something I never tired of.

Both experiences are rewarding in a way that removes you from the shambles of daily existence to somewhere else. Somewhere constructive; somewhere practical; somewhere where you’re a god-equivalent, piecing together clumps of existence. Click by sweet, sweet click.