Our expectations for Vivid Memories were very high. The beautiful artwork and the interesting gameplay, promised a lot. Despite the fact that we are very excited about Vivid and we think it is a great game, our expectations were not quite met. Azul is a game that we played (especially in the beginning) over and over again. A simple, but challenging puzzle game that you easily play a few times in a row. This is certainly not the case with Vivid. Vivid looks beautiful, but is really a mean brain burner that we do not play easily 2 times in a row.

On the one hand, we are very impressed with the challenging gameplay and tricky puzzle that Vivid has to offer. On the other hand, we understand people calling it cumbersome and “fiddly. Solving the puzzle is not as fun and satisfying as in Azul and Sagrada. It can sometimes lead to frustration. The actions are less interesting and fun, especially since you don’t always see immediate results. This is not a reason for us not to like Vivid. In fact, while we are excited about it, we do understand the criticism the game receives. It’s a good game, but you have to manage your expectations. It’s just really different from most abstract puzzle games, both in a positive and negative way. Something that should definitely be said is how good the production is from Vivid.

The components and artwork are beautiful and the quality is outstanding. We ourselves have the edition with the playing mat, which makes for a beautiful set on the table. We can imagine that many people buy Vivid because of the art and  components. We can’t blame these people. As far as we are concerned, Vivid deserves a place in your collection for this reason alone. – Spellenplank (Link)