Lieve Oma uses game conventions to encourage you to act like your character until you’re invested in the story.

Quick​ ​Summary

Look for mushrooms in the forest with your grandma. It’s a short, half-hour experience.   

What’s Interesting About Lieve Oma?

You start a new game and find yourself in a new area with a quest and some quest markers. You probably run right at them, missing a bit of explanation text from an NPC who started talking at you. Does this sort of thing happen, even in a game as mechanics-light as Lieve Oma? Well… it could. It doesn’t matter that your grandma said there’s no rush, or that you’ll be fine even if you don’t find any mushrooms, you still run for that shiny item in the distance. Wait, is this question-mark mushroom the right item? Oh, I walked close enough to grandma and she automatically appraised it. You spend the first part of the game running circles around her, turning the camera this way and that to ensure you don’t miss anything. But slowly, as your character opens up more and you’ve played with the world just enough, you’ll slow your pace to match hers, focus more on the conversation than your collection.

Maybe we will have mushroom risotto tonight after all.

My Play

When I say the section above could happen, I’m trying to say that’s how I experienced the game. I enjoyed that it got me to do things that may have been annoying in other games, like following a slow NPC along a path, and spinning the camera around because the trees blocked my view. That’s partially because it’s a short game so I wasn’t losing much time, but mostly because it’s your grandma walking slowly, and the forest is thick with trees and leaves. Why rush when you can admire the view in good company?

If you want to go for a serene walk, you can find Lieve Oma on Itch.