Saturday Morning Gaming: Finding Zen

Every now and again, Steam has a sale and I see a game that is on sale but it’s not one that I would get for me… but it’s totally a game that is the style that Maribou would love. For the most part, I know better than to get them because, let’s face it, she spends a lot less time in the basement than I do and the games that she plays work well on her laptop and don’t require my much-closer-to-a-gaming-rig.

But every now and again they do a thing where a game is 80% off or something and I see a game that I am certain that she’d love and I think “Yeah, I’ll get that for her.”

Glass Masquerade is a little $5 game that went on a huge sale for $.99 cents back at the beginning of March and I said “what could possibly go wrong?” and I picked it up for her.

She hasn’t played it and I’ve kinda beat it. And downloaded the DLC and beat that too.

It is the most Zen, relaxing, soothing game I have played in years.

The basic idea is that it’s a puzzle game. It’s your goal to put the puzzles together. The puzzles are pictures of stained glass art that represents cultural icons from various regions in the world. You start off in France, for example, and put together a beautiful stained glass puzzle of France’s icon of Marianne (fully clothed, though). And, from there, you travel around the world.

You don’t know what the picture looks like when you start but as it emerges, you can see it start to take shape and then, at the end, you’ve got a beautiful representation of stained glass to feel good about.

Each puzzle took me between 5 and 10 minutes so I found it to be a perfect game to play before bed or when I was waiting for a short, but not TOO short, amount of time.

With all of the DLC, you’ve got about 36 puzzles to complete (and the price of the DLC turns a $5 game into an $8 game… still well worth the money). Without the DLC, you’ve got about 25 puzzles to finish (but they have two free DLC puzzles so you can turn that into 27 puzzles with minimal effort for the same price).

A bargain title that is a great game for someone who wants something soothing to play before bed, before work, or just trying to unwind. It’s not difficult, particularly, it’s not deep, it’s not a game that will ever be part of e-sports… but if you want some relaxation, I can’t believe how soothing I found this game to be. Even if I didn’t originally get it for me, I am really glad that I got it. And beat it. And, yes, there is a setting to remove all progress so you, or someone else, can play it as if it were from the very beginning.

So… what are you playing?

(Featured image is “Choo choo” by Loozrboy. Used under a creative commons license. This image isn’t used in the game, but it’s a good representation of the type of art that shows up in the game.)