The Stamp

This is a short cosmic horror / Lovecraftian investigation game, it can be played in one sitting - it took me 35 minutes to 100% (30 minutes for the first playthrough, then a few more minutes to pick up the one missing achievement). You explore a derelict house and find out what happened there. I wish I could put a neutral rating. I really liked the concept of putting different stamps in a row to act upon the world; the puzzles weren't particularly difficult, but they were intriguing and refreshing. I can't really think of anything quite like it and I would have been happy to have even more. This idea also meshed surprisingly well with the cosmic horror theme, I didn't expect that. (Thinking more about it, there is something inhuman in abstraction, after all!) But the story did not particularly grab me, and the reveals left me cold. I felt like playing a short horror game and The Stamp more than delivered with these unique mechanics, so I don't regret buying and playing it at all, I just wished the story was a bit stronger. I followed the dev and might buy other games from them in the future - Greymarsh looks especially intriguing (I like vintage gamebooks). __ Source of the game…

To someone who from time to time will go back to bits and bobs of Lovecraft's work just to immerse myself in the atmosphere, The Stamp is really perfect. It's got the same allure as reading The Terrible Old Man, He, The Colour Out of Space, and so on; they're just as much mysteries as they are horror. For starters, I thoroughly enjoyed the mechanics and layout. There's something very satisfying about determining where to place each symbol - although, whether in this game or a future one, I'd love to see more options on how to combine them when outside, perhaps leading to some optional exploration with hints of what's to come - and the visual hinting in certain puzzles was just great. They're never complex to the point of irritation, and the length of the game is a boon in allowing the simplest ones to never wear out their welcome. So too does the story end at just the right point and hint just enough at what's beneath. I've always been a firm proponent of never truly knowing the background in tales such as these, which is part of what brought me to Lovecraft in the first place. I'm happy with seeing aftereffects of what's occurred, and finding remnants of whatever forbidden knowl…

A short, minimalistic, but recommended horror adventure.

A quick atmospheric puzzle with some interesting twists and unique mechanic. The last puzzle got me looking up solutions, but overall enjoyed it quite a lot!

Short text-based narrative puzzle game wrapped around a Lovecraftian story. The puzzles all neatly follow the format of selecting a sequence of icons (“stamps”), typically trying to represent something in the text. They make a lot of sense except for the dot puzzle, which had an unclear goal and tough execution, and stalled momentum unnecessarily.

An extremely brief slightly eerie experience. The puzzles aren't too bad once you get used to the stamp idea. $4 is probably a bit much for it, but if you get it for at least 50% off it's a reasonable deal.