Hollow Lantern

Hollow Lantern is slow in the way I wanted it to be. You wander a hand-drawn underground world with a lantern that reveals paths and hides others, and the game trusts you to figure things out with almost no hand-holding. I got pleasantly lost more than once.

The puzzles are environmental rather than abstract — move the light, watch what changes, remember a route. There's a light narrative told through murals and scraps of text, and it stays vague enough to feel personal. The art and ambient sound carry the whole mood.

It can feel aimless if you're not in a patient mood, and a map would have helped in the bigger areas. But when it works, it's one of the most atmospheric things on mobile.

What we liked

• Gorgeous hand-drawn art
• Clever light-based puzzles
• Rich, quiet atmosphere