Try a demo for Encodya, a point-and-click adventure about a girl and her robot

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Encodya is a point-and-click adventure about a young orphan named Tina and her guardian robot Sam-53, who live in a wet, grey near-future world that bears a powerful resemblance to the dystopian Los Angeles of Blade Runner. It's being developed by Nicola Piovesan and Chaosmonger Studio, and while release is still a long way off—Piovesan currently expects it to be ready sometime in the second half of 2020—a demo is available right now, and it's actually quite good.

Playing is very straightforward: Click on a location to move (double-click to run), or click on an object to bring up a context-based menu that will enable you to examine an object, talk to it, pick it up, or use it. There's a little bit of randomization to keep things hopping, and "tons of Easter eggs and hidden secrets to find."

The demo actually takes place the night before the full Encodya adventure begins, as Tina tries to make her way back to her shelter. It comes across as very preliminary, like a pre-game tutorial—the script makes multiple "jokes" about being trapped in a videogame, for instance, and the entire plot is literally about coming up with bus fare.

But it also happens to be quite good: The dialog is silly in spots and it's obviously not going to revolutionize the point-and-click genre, but the interface is clean and simple and the artwork is gorgeous. If the developers can back it up with good dialog and a decent story, Encodya could prove to be a very impressive point-and-click adventure.

Encodya actually emerged from a successful 2018 Kickstarter for an animated short film called Robot Will Protect You, which arose from Piovesan's 2017 project (also successful on Kickstarter) called Attack of the Cyber Octopuses. The Robot Will Protect You campaign promised a videogame as a stretch goal; the goal was achieved, and so here we are.

To access the Encodya demo, you'll need to sign up for the newsletter, which you can do here. A dedicated website isn't available yet, but you can find out more about the game on Facebook.

Andy has been gaming on PCs from the very beginning, starting as a youngster with text adventures and primitive action games on a cassette-based TRS80. From there he graduated to the glory days of Sierra Online adventures and Microprose sims, ran a local BBS, learned how to build PCs, and developed a longstanding love of RPGs, immersive sims, and shooters. He began writing videogame news in 2007 for The Escapist and somehow managed to avoid getting fired until 2014, when he joined the storied ranks of PC Gamer. He covers all aspects of the industry, from new game announcements and patch notes to legal disputes, Twitch beefs, esports, and Henry Cavill. Lots of Henry Cavill.