The House of Tesla is a new point and click puzzle game from the team over at Blue Brain Games. If you’ve played The House of Da Vinci, you’ll feel right at home here. Whether that’s a good thing depends on your patience for puzzles and pixel hunting. The House of Tesla drops you into a beautifully rendered, steampunk-inspired world shaped by the mind of Nikola Tesla. The visuals are polished, the atmosphere is moody, and the puzzles are clever – sometimes to a fault.

Gameplay

It’s a classic point-and-click puzzler built around mechanical contraptions and logic-based challenges. The interface is clean at first glance, but the controls can be quite fiddly. Rotating objects, aligning mechanisms, or interacting with multi-step puzzles often feels more awkward than it should, especially when precision is required. There’s no highlight system for interactable elements either, so you’ll spend a fair bit of time clicking around, hoping something reacts.

The puzzles in The House of Tesla range from simple object manipulation to multi-layered contraptions that span several rooms. Some of the more ambitious designs require you to activate mechanisms in one area to unlock or alter something in another, often without clear feedback. This interconnected structure adds depth, but it can also lead to confusion when you’re not sure which action triggered what.

A recurring mechanic involves powering up devices using Tesla coils, switches, and energy relays. These puzzles often require precise sequencing; finding the right components, routing energy through the correct paths, and activating terminals in a specific order. While the concept fits the theme nicely, the execution can be hit or miss. That’s where the hint system comes in.

The hint system is meant to guide you through tougher sections, but it occasionally ends up being more aggravating than helpful. Hints are vague, sometimes delayed, and often repeat what you already know without offering any real direction. It feels like the game wants you to struggle through trial and error rather than genuinely assist when you’re stuck.

Despite these frustrations, the core puzzle design is clever and rewarding when it clicks. If you’re into decoding cryptic mechanisms and don’t mind a bit of friction, there’s plenty to sink your teeth into.

Presentation

The art direction is top-notch. Every room feels like a love letter to Tesla’s legacy, full of coils, diagrams, and mysterious devices. The environments are richly detailed, with a steampunk flair that suits the theme perfectly. But the focus on aesthetics sometimes comes at the cost of clarity. You’ll often wonder why you can pick up one object but not another, or why certain diagrams can’t be inspected more closely.

Audio design is solid, if understated. Ambient sounds and mechanical whirrs help sell the atmosphere, and the occasional musical cue adds tension without being overbearing. There’s no voice acting, which makes the experience feel a bit more solitary, but it suits the introspective tone of the game. Still, a bit more variety in the soundscape wouldn’t go amiss, especially during longer puzzle sequences.

Flashback cutscenes are used to drip-feed narrative, offering glimpses into Tesla’s past and motivations. They’re visually striking, with a dreamlike quality that contrasts nicely with the grounded puzzle environments. However, they’re brief and often cryptic, leaving you with more questions than answers. It’s clear the story is meant to be pieced together slowly, but some players might find the pacing a bit too sparse to stay invested

Challenge Level

Expect a steep learning curve. The puzzles aren’t impossible, but they do demand a fair bit of trial and error. Some are genuinely clever, while others feel a bit too opaque for their own good. There are moments where the logic behind a solution is so obscure it seems designed to nudge you toward using the hint system. Unfortunately, the hints themselves can be vague, repetitive, or even flat-out wrong, which only adds to the frustration. It’s hard to shake the feeling that the game wants you to struggle more than necessary.

If you’re the sort who enjoys decoding cryptic mechanisms and doesn’t mind a bit of friction, there’s plenty here to keep you engaged. If not, you might bounce off it early.

Final Thoughts

The House of Tesla is a well presented, brain-teasing adventure that clearly aims to honour the legacy of Nikola Tesla through intricate puzzles and atmospheric design. It succeeds in creating a moody, immersive world, but the experience is often undermined by fiddly controls, inconsistent logic, and a hint system that feels more like a monetisation relic than a genuine aid. Despite this entry in the series not launching on mobile, the game’s mobile-first design is hard to ignore, and while it doesn’t ruin the experience on PC, it does make certain frustrations, like the push toward using hints, feel more deliberate than accidental.

For puzzle fans who enjoy a challenge and don’t mind a bit of trial and error, there’s plenty here to appreciate. The mechanical puzzles are satisfying when they work, and the steampunk aesthetic gives the whole experience a distinct flavour. But casual players or those looking for a smoother, more intuitive ride may find themselves worn down by the game’s opacity and uneven pacing.

The House of Tesla was reviewed on PC and launches on PC on the 23rd of September, with console and mobile ports arriving at a later date.

Gamer Social Club would like to thank the publisher for the code.