This series is intended to highlight some of the free games that I enjoy and would recommend. Specifically, the focus will be on games that are permanently free (not free-to-play with microtransactions and not temporarily free) and that are available through the likes of Steam, Itch.io, GOG, or Epic Games. Any recommendations of such games are welcome as well!
I’ve decided to alter my format a bit for these columns going forward. Instead of a longer write-up about a single game, each column will consist of two- or three-paragraph reviews of two or three games. (Unless I find a game that is very long, then I will likely just focus on that one.) This week we are looking at three point-and-click adventures, starting with two dark and horror-leaning games – The Supper and If On a Winter’s Night, Four Travelers – and ending with the absolutely adorable palette cleanser that is Poco.
Game: The Supper
Release Date: January 28, 2020
Developer: Octavi Navarro (White Blanket Games)
Genre: Point-and-Click, Horror
Length: 15 – 30 minutes
Content Warning(s): Blood
Trailer:
Whatever you do, don’t taste the Special Sauce.
The Supper is a macabre, bite-sized point-and-click game that can be completed in thirty minutes or less. You play as an unnamed elderly tavern-keeper who (being prompted by a disembodied voice) is preparing to serve dinner to her three guests and must search for the proper ingredients. As it quickly becomes clear, nothing here is ordinary – not the old woman, not the new arrivals, and certainly not the food. (I mean, one of the dishes on the recipe list is ‘Hand-and-Tongue Stew’.)
I was surprised by just how much of an impression The Supper was able to leave despite its roughly 20-minute run time, much like the previously-covered The Children of Clay. A large part of that is the aesthetics and the game’s tonal balance, which are pretty much flawless. I’ve heard the phrase ‘creepy-cute’ used to describe the Little Nightmares series, and while the art style of The Supper is very different I feel like the term applies. The retro pixel art and the whimsical character designs manage to be unsettling and (at times) bloody, but also very charming. Similarly, the excellent string-and-organ heavy soundtrack manages to feel sometimes light and sometimes deeply ominous while still retaining a cohesive identity. And that balance carries over even to the plot and the writing. I’ll avoid talking too much about what happens, given the short length, but I can say that there are some very serious things going on, including a surprisingly moving ending. Even so, the game manages to sprinkle in enough dark humor to keep things from getting too bogged down.
From a gameplay perspective, none of the puzzles are particularly difficult (although a couple did briefly stump me), but I still found most of them clever. All-in-all, I really enjoyed this one.
Game: If On a Winter’s Night, Four Travelers
Release Date: September 21, 2021
Developer: Dead Idle Games
Genre: Point-and-Click, Horror
Length: 2 hours
Content Warning(s): Blood and Gore, Violence, Suicide
Trailer:
I called this whole instalment of No-Cost Games a triple feature, but that description could readily apply to If On a Winter’s Night, Four Travelers itself. Named after Italo Calvino’s 1979 postmodernist novel If On a Winter’s Night a Traveler (with which it apparently shares nothing else besides a callout to Calvino late in the game), the game follows three confused guests at a masquerade party on a moving train who don’t remember how or when they got aboard. One by one they tell their tragic stories to a mysterious fourth passenger, and we play through the last events each guest can recall. If On a Winter’s Night is essentially an anthology game, with each person’s story containing different settings, characters, and even mechanics. It’s an interesting format, one that allows the developers to explore a variety of complex themes ranging from grief and rage to racism and revenge, and it works very well.
Of the three tales, I liked the second one the best. It had, in my view, the most interestingly designed puzzles and did the best job of incorporating them, some great stylistic effects that would repeatedly alter the scenery, and its story and themes together into one cohesive whole. But that’s not to say the other two stories were bad – on the contrary, they were quite good as well. The first one is definitely the slightest, with few actual puzzles and a very short run time, but it does a good job of introducing the player to the way the game operates. And while I found sections of the third story to drag out just a bit too long, I loved the way it delved deep into cosmic horror territory and ambiguity. There were definite strong points to each of the tales, which really helps to keep the player engaged despite the potential unevenness that the structure could produce.
On top of everything else, the art style was excellent as well. The artwork is more pixelated than that of The Supper, giving the characters more of an abstract look, but the developers were still able to cram so much lavish detail into the locations. I would frequently find myself stopping to just take everything in. When combined with the gameplay and the writing, it really goes to show just how much care the developers put into the game.
Game: Poco
Platform: Steam
Release Date: May 20, 2025
Developer: Whalefall/Micah Boursier
Genre: Point-and-Click
Length: ~ 1 hour
Content Warning(s): A dangerously cute tiny clown
Trailer:
If you read through the first installment of No-Cost Games (BirdGut), you may recognize the name Micah Boursier. Boursier drew all of the art in BirdGut by hand, a decision he took even further in his second (paid) game, The Multi-Medium, in which all of the artwork was hand-made in multiple different artistic mediums (ink and pen, watercolor, oil paint, etc.). While his first two games were solo works (except for the soundtracks), Poco is a team effort directed by Boursier and developed by a group of college seniors for their thesis project. This led to a game that manages to complement the artistic style of Boursier’s previous work while also serving as an excellent showcase for the talent of the students.
Poco, a 2D/3D hybrid point-and-click adventure game in which the backgrounds are 2D and the characters and certain objects are 3D models, follows the titular character, the world’s smallest clown, who has been kicked out of his roaming circus home after being judged to not be clown-enough. Dropped to the world below, he must enlist the help of five denizens of this strange world to build a rocket to get him back home. The game is incredibly charming and positively oozes character. Seriously, it is the most adorable game I’ve played in a long time. The way the hand-shaped cursor changes its gestures depending on how an object can be interacted with, the gibberish sound effects the characters make when talking, Poco’s dialogue text being random symbols while everything else can be understood, Poco’s bouncy running animation complete with jingling bell sounds, there are just so many fun little details that demonstrate the hard work that went into this short, free game. The painterly backgrounds are gorgeous and interact well with the wacky 3D characters. The tiny scale of the characters also allowed the developers to get creative in their use of seemingly massive everyday objects (such as a Gameboy Advance SP being used as a TV), reminiscent of the Pikmin series. Even the soundtrack, created by two of the three composers of The Multi-Medium (a big thing for me, given that The Multi-Medium’s soundtrack is one of my favorite game soundtracks of recent years), is excellent and surprisingly varied for a game this short.
I would generally categorize the puzzles of Poco as mid-level in difficulty – not too hard, but still requiring some thought. They do frequently require backtracking, something that can get a bit annoying but is mitigated somewhat by the game’s small world. There are multiple minigames that assist in breaking up the main gameplay and also provide some good difficulty spikes. The game’s UI and menu systems are very professional looking as well, with a beautiful map and a helpful hint system (which strikes the right balance by showing you where to go but not what to do). And I like how the two endings are entirely dependent on the game’s final choice, and how the game makes it very easy to see both. Honestly, this is probably one of my favorite games I’ve played this year so far. I would have been willing to pay money for it, so to have it released for free feels like an insanely good deal.
On a side note, some players did encounter a softlock scenario in one area of the game. I accidentally did the same thing that they had done that had triggered the softlock, but luckily it didn’t happen to me. I can detail how to avoid the softlock in the comments, if anyone is interested.
Images courtesy of the games’ Steam and Itch.io pages, VGTimes, and PC Gamer
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