The Forgotten City

Had a lot of fun playing through this one almost to the point I did it in only two sittings. The game does an immaculate job at instantly drawing you into itself with its premise and the setting. But the sense of progression it constantly rewards you for lateral thinking is what makes the game for me. There's no dumb arbitrary puzzles here that most people can't possibly solve without looking up a guide, which is something most other games of this genre suffer from, I'm talking to you Outer Wilds. Everything here is presented to you in the character dialogues, things like l loopholes in logic, inconsistencies in arguments, hypocrisies and even the characters' emotional attachments that you can exploit to achieve your goals. Which wouldn't really work if the characters themselves weren't interesting, but they are all (most) incredibly rich with personality, which is quite impressive given just how short the game is. I also want to mention just how much this game respects your time to the point they even turned it into a major plot point, talk about creative!
While I did like this game quite a lot I have some gripes with it that somewhat bogged down the experience, the main culprit being the Skyrim combat segments. They serve absolutely no purpose other than just simply paying a tribute to its origins and being an annoyance. While I like most of the interactions with the characters, there are quite few that are just plain out boring, so their dialogues can feel a little bit expository at times, as if you're conducting an interview of sorts.

Despite the minor flaws I can still say with the utmost confidence that the game is undoubtedly a masterpiece of its kind, so even if this kind of game isn't your thing go play it, you're missing out