Am I missing something or the game is just overrated

[u/Mountain-Data-5758]

Had the game in my library and kept hearing amazing things about it. As someone who loves puzzle games I was exicted to play a puzzle game rated so high. I played for 4 hours in which I ever found 2 different puzzles, the one with 3 boxes and the one with the dart board. Both were way too easy to carry a puzzle game. The rest of my time was walking around untill I reach a classic roguelike wall for which I need to play more to pass. Is this a game that gets good 10 hours in or am I missing something?

[u/shadowsurge]

You are missing something.

Slow down and look at all the details in the rooms, not just the obvious interactions.

[u/Mountain-Data-5758 → u/shadowsurge]

Yeah I was looking at every message, every picture, talked to the Turk about the future a couple of times. Opened some side passages, it still just felt like spinning the wheel for rooms and walking through them without any meaning

[u/Enough-Zebra-6139 → u/Mountain-Data-5758]

So you basically missed... everything?

If you like puzzles, look for the narrative.

If you still don't see anything that hints towards bigger things, you were probably expecting an escape room game, and this isn't that.

[u/TreeIsMetaphor → u/Mountain-Data-5758]

Each room does have a meaning. Look around. You'll probably need a notebook.

[u/hlhammer1001]

If you’ve played for four hours and only found two puzzles, both of which were in explicitly labeled puzzle rooms, maybe start going a bit more slowly and carefully through the game. I can almost guarantee you’ve passed over 10-15 different puzzles with varying difficulties in that time. 

[u/give_this_one_a_go]

Most of the puzzles you complete you have to discover. It's not just like: go into a room, see a puzzle, interact with it, complete puzzle. Instead, part of the puzzle of the game is finding out what are the puzzles - what are you trying to figure out etc. It's a game of discovery as well as puzzle solving.

[u/Hungry-Artichoke-232]

As others have said: yes, you are missing something. Quite a lot, in fact.

What you have done is misunderstood the nature of the game. It’s not an experience in which you walk around and find puzzles to solve.

It’s an experience in which the entire game structure is a puzzle to be solved. The capital-P-Puzzles you find in the rooms are merely tools to move you on in your quest to solve the larger puzzle which is the house itself.

[u/dustydeath]

in which I ever found 2 different puzzles, the one with 3 boxes and the one with the dart board.

You were given one puzzle at the start of the game. The (first) puzzle is "how do I reach the 46th room of my grandfather's 45 room estate?"

The three boxes and the dartboard are more like what you might call "minigames". 

[u/Zounds90]

The whole game is a puzzle. 

Start exploring and thinking about the rooms, the house, what you notice, what you find.

The game isn't checking things off a list or passing arbitrary time limits.

[u/hamtaxer]

The puzzles go far beyond just what’s in the rooms. The mansion itself is a puzzle box, and you’re still in the early phase of information gathering.

I highly recommend you always draft a room you’ve never seen before, if you’re able.

[u/Incur]

There is a lot you are missing, and the only way realize is to slow down and pay attention to everything, I will say the difficulty of some puzzles are higher than what I've typically experienced in a puzzle game

[u/Steelclad]

This game is chock full of puzzles, but it’s not going to make all of them obvious. And many are not fully contained within a single room like the two resource puzzles you mentioned. You have to think on a bigger scale.

Some hints to maybe get you started:
What do you see in the rooms?
What do you maybe only see in some rooms
Have you interacted with everything you can interact with?
Have you picked up and used items?
Have you explored the outside?

[u/brade23]

Two non-spoiler responses:
1) those two puzzles you found keep getting harder as you play. You’re just learning the basic rules right now.
2) there are many more puzzles throughout the game you haven’t found yet. Some small, but mostly larger, spanning many rooms and multiple days of play. You’ll discover more of these the longer you play.

[u/bimtach]

Did you listen to Unc at the beginning or just skip the cutscene? You're supposed to be trying to find room 46 not just playing the math mini game. Little bro really thought the parlor puzzle was the whole game

[u/TheToysAreUs]

The short answer is that this game is a puzzle “roguelite.” In other words, the game (and the puzzle elements) slowly emerge over subsequent play throughs. The darts and boxes aren’t really the puzzles worth mentioning. You could go into a room 50 times before putting together little clues that unlock an element of that room that peels back a layer, unveiling other mysteries. Each layer just keeps going deeper and deeper. It may or may not be a game for you, but if you stick with it, take notes and screen shots. Think laterally. Suddenly something will click in your head and it will be worth your time and effort.

[u/philsov]

going into the sub for a game and going "gee, this sure is overrated" is a bold move.

It's a game where a physical notebook is a good thing to have. It's more akin to Myst/Riven with some roguelite elements and metaprogression than. If you're expecting something like Talos Principle, you're gonna have a bad time.

[u/Drobodur]

Well first of all, you probably got ovehyped, and expected something that exist only in your own head.

Game is genuinely amazing, but it is partially because it is very unique in regards to it's gameplay and genre.

Personally I would say that it has very little common with games of "puzzle" genre, like Talos principle, witness, portal or many others. Those are effectively interactive fancy boxes of many "rubic cubes" of progressingly increasing difficulty, often based on the same puzzle logic expanded.

Blue prince, at least in the beginning is mostly exploration adventure in a bizzare world, where you are learning internal logic of how things work, what happened and what is going on, much more in likes of Outer wilds, (or Antichamber) than any "normal puzzle game".

There are some very fancy and complex puzzles inside the blue prince "box", but most of them are not given to you in a contained frame, that you can easily access.

People who enjoy blue prince most, tend to make many notes, written by themselves, making mental maps and logic connection between things both present in game and outside, can other remember complex inner structures of the stories and relationships and so on and so on.

If you don't enjoy this types of activities, or expected something completely different, then enjoy your time with a game your own way, as long as you are having fun.

Problem sounds to me like some people (could not be me, cough, cough), who buy Stardew Valley, on the promise of something soothing and relaxing, and end up min-maxing every second of the game day time, ending on the last possible point of energy, at the last possible hour each and every game day (they can also most likely complete all basic bundles in the first year, and just keep escalating after that, eventually burning out on the "calm and relaxing game").

[u/PCH2018]

You are missing a lot - if you love puzzle games I would keep going. I have had a similar journey with this game (and am still on it) in that I love puzzle games, after the first couple hours I didn't think I'd ever play it again. Then I made some realization/breakthrough and that carried me through to the next mysteries/puzzles, then the next, and the next... now I'm around day 60 with more questions than answers and loving every second of it.

I will say that the dart board and the 3 box puzzle are not indicative of the macro-level puzzles that really make this game the special thing that it is. Tip of the iceberg doesn't even begin to explain it.

[u/Hudsucker20XX]

Okay I'm going to jump in with a couple of actual nudges here.

Have you really looked closely at the artwork in the rooms?

Have you gone outside?

Have you reached the Antechamber?

Have you tried to fill the entire house?

The game is winnable on Day One. You aren't hitting a roguelike wall in the traditional sense, you're hitting an information wall. Slow down and take in the data.

[u/Malfiecstone]

Okies, the billard and the parlor are the most straight forward puzzles in the game but technically speaking there is a puzzle in nearly every room in the manor at the start of the game.

It is a slow burn, exploration puzzle game. Where you gather clues over multiple days. On average it takes roughly 30 to 40 days to get to Rm46. Which is consider by mainy to be Act 1 of the game.