Object hunt an odd fit

It's entirely fitting that Dream Chronicles got lost among the sea of big-ticket Xbox Live Arcade games that were released around it, and not just because it's a game centred around finding proverbial needles in proverbial haystacks.

Dream Chronicles
Reviewed for: Xbox 360 via Xbox Live Arcade
Also available for: Nintendo DS, Windows PC, Macintosh, iPhone/iPod Touch
From: KatGames/Hudson
Rating: G 

Chronicles is a hidden-object game, which, for the uninitiated, presents players with mostly static environments and tasks them with finding items hidden within the scene that help complete whatever task is needed to advance to the next scene.

At that, Chronicles does fine, mixing in object hunts with the occasional light puzzle-solving diversion and wrapping it inside a story that, while kind of incomprehensible, is engaging in a strangely soothing way.

But object hunts are an odd fit for a system that operates on the strength of a controller rather than a mouse, and while Chronicles cleverly lets players "peek" into the scene with the triggers, using a joystick to move a cursor around will always feel awkward.

Chronicles also is too short and too easy to command the same asking price as Super Meat Boy and four tables of Pinball FX 2, to name only two recent XBLA games that provide more value and take much better advantage of the system's strengths.

The same game is available for less money on platforms that suit it better, so if the game intrigues you, let this version be and shop around.

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