I'm going to teach you to love hidden object games

It's a fact: Hidden object games have a less-than-stellar reputation among the gamer cognoscenti. They're commonly viewed as low effort, vacuous, beneath the notice or caring of real gamers⁠—a sort of proto-slop, in many ways, that predates the rise of AI. They're games your mom plays. Ewwww.

Dramatic exaggeration? Not really. Back in 2016, we published a story entitled " My shameful obsession with hidden object games on Steam," whose author chose to remain anonymous to avoid the consequences of their humiliating admission—and yeah, maybe that was a bit of dramatic exaggeration. But it vividly illustrates the point that hidden object games are not taken seriously by serious gamers.

I'm here to change that. I'm here to tell you that hidden object games are good, actually, and that it's a valid genre worthy of respect. Because videogames can be anything. …