FAR: Changing Tides, a casual puzzle platformer developed by Okomotive, is the sequel to the popular FAR: Lone Sails. Set in the same world, you play a child on a sea journey whose purpose gradually reveals itself.

Most of the game’s controls and puzzles are straightforward and deducible by trial and error. Buttons or actionable items have a distinctive cyan colour and, later in the game, yellow lights direct the player’s focus. While movement feels unrestricted, most areas present only a few actual options to the player. Getting stuck is usually caused by insufficient exploration or wrong assumptions. “Breaking” a puzzle or losing required items is impossible.

The puzzles’ goals are usually progression, usually travelling from left to right. However, sometimes solving puzzles improves your ship, such as adding an engine or a new mode of transport. Sometimes they hint more about the world, such as revealing a diorama or a painting.

The game is short, containing about five to six hours of playtime. While that may dissuade some from its undiscounted price, the design of FAR: Changing Tides is economical and efficient. Mechanics are introduced, practised then the game moves on without overdoing them. Lengthening the game would not necessarily have made it better.

As with the previous game, FAR: Changing Tides separates puzzle areas with long stretches of travel. Your ship’s controls are puzzles themselves, like tacking the sails against the wind or powering the engine. Once the controls are mastered, these travel stretches give you short breaks, temporarily immersing yourself in the world via the backgrounds and soundtrack. 

FAR: Changing Tides tells its story by implication and subtle reference. The flooded world drowned humanity’s cities and towns, but the strewn detritus shows the flood’s ferocity and suddenness. The unnamed protagonist encounters no living humans, only hints of their existence.

FAR: Changing Tides continues the retrofuturistic “dieselpunk” feel of FAR: Lone Sails, putting 1930s through 50s aesthetics on advanced technology. Desaturated colours and dull, rendered plaster buildings are typical of that era and make the world feel bleak. The rusting carcasses of humanity’s leviathan mechanical creations dot the landscape. Some are almost organic, and you can hear a faint heartbeat when nearby.

This desolation contrasts with the game’s naturalistic moments. Nature continues. The deer, birds and sea life are oblivious to your and humanity’s struggles. Glimpses of bioluminescent jellyfish or rays through your ship’s glass bottom or distant whales are wondrous moments.

FAR: Changing Tides, as implied, is about the younger generation reacting to contemporary issues like climate change. The protagonist is a child, forced to undertake a journey to build a better life. He or she finds toys like wooden stags, music boxes and stuffed ducks but cannot play with them, forced to grow up early to confront older generations’ hubris.

The protagonist demonstrates how the newer generation views the world. He or she does not blame technology – it is unclear in FAR: Changing Tides what caused the flood. Technology is something the new generation masters early and is vital to survival. The ship even looks like one a child might draw. The ending shows the new generation’s focus on each other and subversively ties it back to FAR: Lone Sails.

However, FAR: Changing Tides could have appealed to our senses more. While the game’s engine has moved from predominantly 2D to wholely 3D – and shows it off at the end – much of the extensive backgrounds are simple and blandly textured. The developers are going for a stylized, cheap-to-develop aesthetic. However, desaturated does not mean uninteresting. The soundtrack adds emotion and context to otherwise empty moments but lacks memorable motifs or consistency.  

The casual puzzle platform genre also has limits. Its puzzles are too simple for someone wanting a challenge. The storytelling is too subtle for those looking for clear themes. Experienced gamers enjoy these short diversions but the gaming landscape continues to expand and diversify beyond puzzle platformers.

That said, FAR: Changing Tides is a worthy successor to FAR: Lone Sails, developing its novel vehicle operation mechanic enough to feel different but still comfortable. Those looking for a casual but not overly taxing game will enjoy it, especially if you fondly remember FAR: Lone Sails.