Samorost 1: the space gnome that kicked off the whole saga

Released as a short adventure in 2003, the series' starting point has been given a sound and visual remaster — and it still splits the players who show up hoping for the heft of the chapters that came later.

The space gnome's beginning, in miniature

This one came first: the space gnome's lean little adventure, released in 2003 and later preserved by GOG in an edition with remastered sound, touched-up graphics and a new score by composer Floex.

The store page files the game under fantasy adventure, solved by clicking around the scenery to unlock the next scene. Amanita Design is behind the project and handles distribution too — and, as it happens, that same page still lists the title as early access, a label that usually marks an unfinished game, stuck here on an adventure that wrapped up years ago.

The store offers no playable trailer file, only the thumbnail; anyone who wants to see the game in motion has to rely on the screenshots posted in the gallery beside the text.

The Chinese onion that turned into a joke, and other reasons to go back

Among those who weighed in on the re-release, the praise recurs with small variations: the puzzles aren't obvious even after more than one playthrough, yet they never stall anyone for long. One player, writing on May 29, 2021, grants that the remaster changed the music and the sound effects enough to notice the difference from the original — not jarring enough to bother, but enough to miss having an option to bring the old audio back.

Someone writing on June 1, 2021 hadn't even expected to find the title on GOG, remembering it as a browser game that had been offered at no cost — and counts the adventure among Amanita Design's finest, working just like the two chapters the series gained afterward. Another write-up, from December 23 of the same year, laughs recalling a smoking Chinese onion, a scene that alone would justify the visit, and promises to return to the studio's catalog after years away from point-and-click games.

The praise crosses languages: a German-language write-up from June 6, 2022 praises the atmosphere and states that the remaster turned out well and runs smoothly. And someone who describes himself as an older player, in a piece from November 19 of the same year, nearly docked a star for the short running time but kept full marks for the creativity and a charming character, and says he'll go after the next two games following this introduction.

When what some praise becomes another's complaint

The lone dissenting voice on record, from March 29, 2026, doesn't reject the game: it calls the atmosphere good, but denies that brevity and easy puzzles are enough to call the title good, and only agrees to press on through the series in the hope that the next two chapters last longer and deliver more of a challenge.

That is the only voice gathered in the dossier that disagrees, and it doesn't quarrel with the material — it quarrels with its size. It's the same miniature the others praise for fitting into a spare afternoon.

Right for an afternoon, wrong for anyone after more heft

So what's left is the criterion that separates who walks away satisfied from who walks away grumbling: anyone up for a single sitting, who wants to know the series' starting point and doesn't need the game to last longer than a spare afternoon, comes away satisfied — it's the account repeated most among those who weighed in.

Anyone who comes in expecting the same heft as the chapters that followed, or a difficulty able to stall them for more than one sitting, closes the game with the very complaint of the assessment that stood apart from the chorus: lovely, but too short to carry the label of good on its own.