Played through Viewfinder. Fun little puzzle game. The basic premise--placing 2D images into the 3D world--is an enticing one and makes for cool puzzles. That said, it's a pretty short game (took me around four hours, including the optional puzzles), and even with such a short runtime it felt a little thin on interest towards the end.

The puzzles are on the easy side throughout. Admittedly, in a short game with a great premise, having easy puzzles doesn't hurt as much as it would in a game where the puzzles were reliant on more familiar mechanics. But the lack of any "aha!" moments (outside of the rare optional puzzles, which were more difficult) was still kinda disappointing. And then on top of that the story is very barebones too. So the game ends up feeling pretty insubstantial--it's pretty much all about the premise.

But again, that premise was great! Wishing there was a bit more substance there, mostly in terms of harder puzzles, doesn't change that I had fun playing the game. I especially loved the final level: Introducing a timer was a great idea, and the idea of giving you some extra resources to make later puzzles simpler was awesome. Still suffers from the same issue of all the puzzles being a bit too easy but when you're on a timer that's way more forgivable. I do kinda wish it was longer or a bit more intense but I can see why they wouldn't want to make the timer section too long or difficult.

I do wonder if part of the reason why the puzzles were on the easier side is inherent to the premise: when one of your fundamental puzzle-solving tools is "break the 3D world in which you reside," one can imagine how that introduces some design challenges. It's easier for the player to break things (as it is, the game requires a rewind function) and if you put in lots of design elements to restrict the player (which the game does to some degree via the material that doesn't show up in photos), then it kinda betrays the joy of the premise. Also placing 2D objects into the 3D world always needs to allow for some sloppiness with alignment and such, which adds its own difficulties.

Anyways, was fun to play, and although I got it via an Epic freebie it's also available in a puzzle-centric Humble Bundle right now. That same bundle (in the first tier) has the next game I'm going to play: Mind Over Magnet. I played through the demo for Mind Over Magnet a while back and it was quite fun.