Grandma's Attic Search

What you do

Grandma's Attic Search is a hidden object game set in one richly painted attic. Each search lists five to eight keepsakes as shadows cut from the painting. The big toys are easy from across the room, but a thimble on the braided rug or spectacles on the folded blankets only show up when you zoom in. Every keepsake you find fills Grandma's scrapbook with its own memory, and finishing the scrapbook is the ending.

• One detailed attic painting with 49 keepsakes, each traced to its real outline in the art.
• Clues are shadows cut from the painting: named in the first two searches, then shapes only, then deep silhouettes.
• Twelve searches that grow from five big keepsakes to eight small ones, with tighter star times.
• A magnifier that refills over 35 to 45 seconds.

How to play

1. The list at the bottom (beside the attic on a wide screen) shows the keepsakes to find as shadows. Tap a shadow to see it bigger.
2. Zoom in and look around the attic, then tap a keepsake when you spot it. It flies into the list.
3. Wrong taps add seconds: 3 for the first, then 5, 8 and 12 for wrong taps in a row, and taps pause briefly after each one.
4. The magnifier circles one keepsake. It refills over time, and quick finds (within 6 seconds of the last) fill it faster.
5. Find everything for one to three stars by search time. If time runs out, Grandma calls you down for tea and the search is lost.
6. Each finished search adds its new keepsakes to Grandma's scrapbook and opens the next search. Fill all 49 pages to finish the scrapbook.

Controls

• Touch: pinch to zoom, drag to look around, tap a keepsake.
• Mouse or trackpad: scroll to zoom where the pointer is, drag to look around, click a keepsake.
• Keyboard: + and - (or E and Q) zoom, arrow keys or WASD look around, Space or Enter taps the circle in the middle, H uses the magnifier, 1 to 8 show a clue bigger, 0 or F shows the whole attic, Escape opens the search menu.
• Buttons: +, - and the whole-attic button beside the attic; the magnifier and the menu above it.
• Shared toolbar: pause, restart, mute, help and fullscreen.

Tips worth knowing

• Spot the big shapes first from the whole-attic view, then zoom into one corner at a time for the small ones.
• A tap that lands a little outside a keepsake still counts, so zoom until it is a comfortable size rather than tapping a speck.
• Familiar keepsakes come back in later searches. Remembering where they sit is the quickest way to three stars.
• Save the magnifier for the shape you cannot place. Tap its shadow first and the magnifier goes to that one.
• Missed a star? Replay the search: the new keepsakes stay the same and the familiar ones change.

Accessibility

• Every action works by touch, mouse or keyboard; the keyboard steers a circle in the middle of the attic and Space taps it.
• Taps count a little outside each keepsake's outline, more generously on touch screens, and zooming makes small keepsakes large.
• There is a clock: searches are timed for stars and end at a limit, but pause stops it and the magnifier can circle a keepsake.
• Found keepsakes get a check mark both in the attic and in the list, so progress does not rely on color alone.

Guides and roundups

• Best Cozy Hidden Object and Search Games