What's the genre distinction between these two? For instance, https://www.gog.com/game/my_brother_rabbit is listed as a Hidden Object game, but reading over the game card and what it has, it sounds like any of the Amanita Design games (Samrost, Machinarium, Botanicula) could easily fall into "Hidden Object" games.

Where's the line? What's the distinction? (I haven't experienced any of the games on GOG in the Hidden Object categories, though this discussion is likely to push me to try one.)

Good question. I think the only difference between these is how the player finds items and what he does with it.
In point and click you simply click at the wardrobe or the chest, get the object and try to find the solution of the problem by mixing the items.
In hidden object as the name suggests the items are hidden and before you get them, you need to find it and other things which you won't use at all at the specially prepared scenes and then use it at the place which was already hinted by the gamemakers.

You just explained p'n'c adventures ;)

I for one love Hidden Object when my brain is moving too slow for the puzzles inherent in the average P&C.

Yeah HOG's are great for playing sessions where you don't want to invest too much brain activity.

For me point-and-click adventures need to have a character that interacts with the environment and other characters, you control him/her and his actions. This game looks like you mostly interact directly with the environment, not through the character.

In Machinarium you control the robot who interacts with objects and solves puzzles, but in Samorost 1 you interact with the environment and the character just reacts to it, which makes them different from each other. I don't remember Samorost 2, I think it was a mix of these two, and I haven't played Botanicula.

Which is why I'm so jazzed GOG started carrying them. After a long day it's a nice laid back way to game without the pressure/thought of RPGS, Strategies, P&Cs but they are also a break from the speed and intensity of FPS. They are a beautiful calming middle ground.

If you like to try a hidden object game, there's 2 copy of The Tiny Bang Story available in the community giveaway thread.

For me the most defining difference are usually the so called Hidden Object screens in HOGs, which aren't about picking up useful items you need for your adventure but about finding a bunch of random items that have hardly any connection to it, according to some list of words, just for the "fun" of it, as some kind of detached puzzle. It often ends with you getting an item you need, but the way how you get to it doesn't really make sense in terms of story-telling.

Games like Tiny Bang Story, Samorost, possibly My Brother Rabbit share similarities with HOGs (simple gameplay that often just comes down to clicking the right spots on screen*) but don't have this common element of the other games in the genre, so they're somewhere in between. Then again, Samorost has an actually character who's going places and doing things and who's visible on (almost?) every screen, which is different from Tiny Bang Story where you're just an incorporeal onlooker who's traveling from screen to screen, so to me Samorost is still closer to point-and-click games like Machinarium, even if you don't directly control the character. This doesn't really work as defining criterion though, as most HOGs have characters following a story, too, though usually in first person perspective.

To me HOGs seem inspired by FP puzzle/adventure games like Island of Dr. Brain and Myst, but mixed with Where's Waldo, more casual puzzles, more sparkle and constant reward mechanisms.

(* Of course you can say that about P&C adventures, too, but there it's often a more complicated combination of clicks.)

Yes, I've been sucked in on a HOG,
thinking it was an a regular Adventure game.

Sometimes its hard to distinguish,
looking at the box, if it says BigFish Games,
can tip you off.

The couple of HOG's I've played seem to use static screen and a
predetermined list/number of things you must find in order to advance.

Where as an adventure game you must find things sometimes,
but you can interact with the object you have found and can
usually advance at will to another screen....until you get stuck

HOG's now-a-days usually have plenty adventure game elements, some even include combining inventory objects with other inventory objects. They also have lots of minig games which are not "HOG" scenes.

So what really defines a HOG is that it has actuall HOG scenes: You're presented with a screen with tons of stuff on it, and a list of objects to find in the scene. Once you find all the objects in the list, one of them is the useful object placed into your inventory.

Sometimes HOGs switch it up so that, for example, instead of a list of named objects you're looking for parts of an item by their outlines, and then once you find all of them they combine into the useful item you need to progress.

point and click is a game mechanic, its used to shortcut key strokes during a game rather than complicated UI actions it consolidates gameplay. Hidden Object games employ point and click mechanics, the game play consists of using the mouse to click on objects determined by a list from the game creators using different strategy styles depending on the dev. Point and click games can be any kind of game that uses the mouse to do different game mechanics, they can be adventure, hidden object, visual novels, action and so on tho the limited mouse function determines the complexity of the game

i love point/click cuz im lazy

i like Hidden Object games as a bedtime activity to help me to wind down to sleep.


popular HOG employ adventure story telling that is broken up with mini games, some of which are hidden object. it can be a bit disconcerting to have your character running from a monster but stop and rummage in a garbage pile to find a piece of glass to be used in a mosaic that opens a path to a cemetery where you dig thru a bureau to find a key.......... and so on. some are quite absurd, some are pretty good. most employ gorgeous graphical art to make up for minimal animation.

And I can really recommend the game, esp if you have kids.

Are you suggesting that you need to have kids to be psychic?

No but to have priceless "shits and giggles". Guess your bonsai donkeys can't help you there ;-)