Review: Harvey’s New Eyes

In the modern age of gaming, the point-and-click adventure game is a rare breed, and I, personally, somehow have more difficulty with the genre than I did when I was a kid. Despite my struggles with Edna & Harvey: Harvey’s New Eyes, however, I still very much admire it, as it is a game that really required me to put on my thinking cap in order to succeed.

My psychiatrist thinks games are good for my mental health in part because they give me practice with my reflexes and critical thinking skills. Harvey’s New Eyes is not a twitch game, but it does give your brain a workout. It s a game of puzzles, but not Tomb Raider puzzles; here, your mind will be tested as you attempt to figure out how to manipulate people and solve problems that have no obvious solution.

Harvey’s New Eyes is in no way forgiving — puzzles are sprawling and have many steps that are required to solve them, and it is a challenge just to keep track of what you’re trying to do — but it never feels as if completion is out of your reach, even as the game succeeds at being wildly frustrating. Nothing comes easy here; you’ll map out the path to a solution, but as you travel that path you’ll be confronted with new obstacles. It sometimes feels as if said obstacles never stop getting in your way, but that just makes the game more fun. It can be overwhelming, but if it weren’t very challenging it would would be a satisfying gameplay experience.

A lot of folks might be turned off by that challenge if the presentation weren’t so wildly pleasing. The heroine of Harvey’s New Eyes is a young girl named Lilli who can’t seem to get a word in edgewise and seems to suffer from all sorts of relatively mild mental disorders. She’s followed around by a narrator who makes really funny observations about what is going on inside her head. 

During her adventures, she meets all sorts of colorful characters, such as the girls who are obsessed with manga and yell “SHING” a lot. And these characters love to talk, sometimes going on for minutes without really contributing anything to the story. But the writing is so sharp that these monologues don’t irritate; instead they are very entertaining and usually feature serious laugh-out-loud moments. I haven’t played a game this consistently amusing in a long time.

That the writing is so effective is a bit shocking as the English version of the game is a translation from the original German. It really feels as if it were first written in English. The voie actors, too, should be lauded for spectacular delivery of these lines. We simply don’t expect such quality from a budget-priced title, but this game sets a high standard for quality.

Of course, what most people notice first about Daedalic games is the hand-drawn world, which is beautiful. Don’t expect realism; just enjoy the impeccable craft on display. Plenty of care has clearly gone into putting this game together.

It’s unusual for me to declare that a game has no flaws, but Harvey’s New Eyes might be such a game. Some players will undoubtedly call it frustrating, but I would assert that they simply need to accept the game for what it is. It’s not for everyone, but those who give it the time and effort will be better off for it.

Final Verdict

5 out of 5 stars