Polyarc’s Moss hides clever VR game design under its cuteness

The adorable action-adventure virtual reality game Moss debuted at this year’s Electronic Entertainment Expo last week for Sony’s PlayStation VR. It’s the first game from Polyarc Games, a studio founded by ex-Bungie developers.

Moss takes place in a fairy tale setting that springs up out of an actual virtual book. The player embarks on an adventure with Quill, the little mouse heroine, to explore ruins and solve puzzles. The storybook aesthetic has a dual function in the premise as well as the way players interact with it. Each scene is almost like a set piece from the story. When the player moves from scene to scene, the sound of pages turning notifies them that they’re moving from one thing to the next.