I knew almost nothing about Snufkin or the Moomins, or their idyllic but oddly disaster-ridden valley, until I started playing Snufkin: Melody of Moominvalley, a feel-good musical adventure from Scandinavian studio Hyper Games. Since then, I’ve read three of Tove Jansson’s original books, my kids have watched the 1990s animated series, and my wife just bought a diary with three of the characters on the cover. As Moomin fandom and subculture continues to creep up, I’d like to thank (or blame?) for this game. In that respect, I think you might get even more out of it if you have some history with these characters and can ride the wave of cameos and nostalgia. While it doesn’t quite reach the quality of the book (which is probably a stretch), the whole family was still enthralled by the exquisite art and music, the quirky inhabitants of Moominvalley, and the simple but fun adventures of the cast. Spelling.

“It takes a long journey to really know how wonderful home is.”
– Snufkin (The Comet in Moominland, 1946)

Snufkin is a nature-loving, free-spirited hiker in a tattered green cap and hat who travels south from Moominvalley to warmer climes every autumn and winter, leaving his best friend Moomin behind. This year, after spending months alone doing something (fishing? walking? philosophizing?), Snufkin returns to the valley and, to his dismay, finds well-kept parks and gardens lined with squared-off cast iron hedges, fences and plenty of signs and notices prohibiting all manner of activities, from running to camping to sniffing. Responsible for this is a strict, cantankerous park ranger, who has robbed the valley of much of its wild, natural beauty and even dried up the river. To make matters worse, Snufkin’s friend Moomin seems to have gone missing.

“Isn’t life fun! Everything can suddenly change for no reason!”
– Moomintroll (Moominpappa at Sea, 1965)

Your job as Sniffles is to find Moomintroll and restore the valley to its former glory… Well, everyone destroyed the public park, I guess. Most of the story is taken from Jansson’s book Moomin Summer Van Sin, in which Schnupfelich rips down all the signs in the park for the park rangers. This only takes up part of a chapter in the book (albeit with consequences), but here the idea is expanded upon and becomes one of the central motivations of the game. It works well to create conflict, but it might be a bit of an odd choice, especially when presented in a family-friendly way that is less detailed and less nuanced than the book. Snufkin causes so much property damage in this game that it crosses the line of general civil disobedience and goes into the realm of eco-terrorism, but at least he plays a mean harmonica. Most of the time, I don’t mean this completely seriously, but I frequent public parks, where there might be signs or trimmed hedges here and there, so I try to keep an eye on my kids to make sure they don’t do anything good. Ideas.

“Run away!” Moominmamma cried. “The police are here!” She didn’t know what Moomin’s son had done, but she was sure she approved of it. Upset is. The Nordic landscapes are beautifully illustrated with rich watercolors, vibrant and colorful enough to appear in a children’s storybook, but also artistic, so I made one of the beautiful valley views my desktop wallpaper. The hand-animated style, with its low frame rate and slightly flickering textures, adds warmth and naturalness to the environment in a pleasant way. The bird’s-eye view is almost a pity, because the cut scenes and the layered vistas across cliffs, rolling hills, ocean horizons and pale blue skies are some of the best depictions of Moominvalley I’ve ever seen, even if they’re missing a few things: Jansson’s original illustrations of eerie mysticism. And yet, even looking down over grass and rocks, they’re still pretty fascinating.

“It would be terrible if the world exploded. It would be so wonderful and magnificent.”
– Snufkin (The Comet in Moominland, 1946)

As Snufkin, you wander the world using your keyboard or controller, talking to the inhabitants of different valleys, exploring different wilderness areas, and solving simple traffic puzzles by moving around. Move around rocks and move tree trunks to climb cliffs, cross rivers, and pick up an item or two lying around. These are automatically used when you interact with the right object or engage with the right character. You also collect harmonicas, flutes, and drums. Using these creates glowing areas around you, and they affect your surroundings in different ways depending on the situation, but usually through some kind of enchanted animal. For example, you might lead a duckling to its mother, release a spider from its nest, or make a giant crab drop a stuffed dog.

Like all good musicians, inspiration is needed to achieve the desired effect in a melody. And here you mostly get inspiration, like any good musician, by rushing headlong into the bush. It comes in the form of small glowing balls that prefer to hide in the wild brush, but you can also collect it by helping others in various side quests. As you stock up on an abundance of inspiration, a small gauge fills up, and when it reaches the top, you reach a new “level” of inspiration. Animals and obstacles may have numbers on them, meaning that you can only charm or remove them if you have reached the appropriate level or higher. This can be useful to block off certain areas of the valley until you have explored enough of the passable areas. It’s a neat mechanism, with some subtle quirks depending on the instrument, but it doesn’t feel like it utilizes its full potential, as more often than not you’re just pressing buttons in various places with clearly-defined signals pressed.

It’s a perfect night to listen to this song, Snufkin thought. A new melody, part expectation, part spring sadness, and the rest is the great joy of just walking alone and loving it.
(Tales of Moominvalley, 1962)

Speaking of music, the soundtrack by composer Oda Tylset features collaborations with Icelandic band Sigur Rós, who helped with some of the instrumental scores, not to mention two licensed songs at the beginning and end. Play at the end to reinforce the emotion. The soundtrack is folksy, friendly and minimalist, blending into the scenery most of the time, but adding many elements to the beautiful visuals and relaxed pace, occasionally spiced up with something more lively depending on the scene. It’s atmospheric sound design with gentle breezes, birds chirping, and waves lapping on the shore. There is no voice acting apart from a few “ums” and “hoons”, so my wife and I had to do all the voice acting for our kids, complete with awful British and Irish accents, much to the kids’ surprise.

But what does this calm, friendly atmosphere have to do with the vandalism I mentioned? Another gameplay element is the “scary” parks. These are created by park rangers and are basically a series of little areas surrounded by hedges. To rid the valley of the plague, you enter every park, distracting the guards or sneaking past them when they’re not looking (they have vision cones and stuff), knocking over statues, ripping up signs and causing general mayhem. Propaganda The Moomin-esque mischief and mayhem continues until all the guards are gone and nature has reclaimed the place. I don’t usually like stealth sections in games, but these are so quick, easy and light-hearted that I enjoyed them very much. And my kids had a great time at the expense of others, watching me wreak anti-authoritarian havoc and get chased by the cops every time they found me.

“Snufkin had been waiting all his life to tear up the paper that told him not to do what he wanted.”
(Moomin Summer Madness, 1954)

Apart from the stealth sections, there are a few more cases. Action-oriented gameplay, especially the early section where you are chased through a dark forest by a terrifying (misunderstood?) ice monster known as The Groak. Such sections may require some reflexes, but they are short and very forgiving. In fact, despite the various mechanics, the gameplay and puzzles are not complex and hardly difficult, probably aimed at younger players or simply a relaxing experience. The path of the main plot is fairly linear and appears in the form of quests that are added to your journal to remind you where to go and what to do. If you don’t know exactly where it is, there is a map of the valley. It has quest markers so you won’t get lost.

The exception to this difficulty are some side quests that you collect while exploring the valley and talking to the locals. Moominpappa has lost the pages of a great play manuscript and must find them hidden in the wilderness. Usually this requires simple puzzles; the main quest requires at least some of them, while the rest are optional and do not provide their locations. There are other quests like this, and considering how many Steam achievements I ended up not being able to achieve, it shows that there is more to this game than I found in my first four hours of play. So it’s nice that something is on offer for those who want a bit more of a challenge.

“It’s funny how life is so simple that it makes people sad, even angry.”
– Moominmamma (Moominpappa of the Sea, 1965)

If you’re already familiar with the Moominverse, you’re probably familiar with all the characters; old friends like Little My, Too-Ticky, and Philly John. The dialogue is light-hearted and often humorous (I especially liked his conversation with Muskrat). But despite Snufkin’s anarchic tendencies, the story somehow feels safe and simple. Frankly, there’s nothing wrong with enjoying a casual, nostalgic game on a Sunday afternoon, but after reading some of Jansson’s original work, the themes of unique wistfulness, witty wisdom, and hope in the face of rather dangerous situations (comets, volcanoes, floods, midlife crisis), are less prevalent in this game. Even the ending is pleasant, rather than as vengeful as I had feared, and is presented in a more direct and sentimental way than the richer, more complex narratives of the other Moomin tales. That’s not to say the game isn’t good, it’s wholesome family fun, and I might get some strange looks if I actually said “it’s not as good as the book”, but it borrows heavily from the template so I think it’s an appropriate comparison to make.

“I respect your conclusion, but you are completely and utterly wrong beyond any shadow of a doubt.”
– Muskrat (Moomintroll in Finn’s Family, 1948)