Local Paper Small Town
Local Paper Small Town is a 2-player co-op puzzle game about spreading happiness around a quirky papercraft town.
Team up with a friend, using a physical newspaper and VR, to discover Smalltown and its charming cast of characters by communicating and relating between both formats.
One player explores the town in VR, solving puzzles by moving cardboard cutout characters around, entering codes, and working with the second player to fill in their newspaper crossword puzzle and deducing each character’s story and place in the game world. The second player, equipped with the PDF of the Smalltown newspaper, reads and scans pages for clues that may help both players advance the game state by solving puzzles in VR thanks to their shared understanding of the characters, similar to a collaborative escape room, but with more narrative flavouring.
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How to play:
In this two-player experience, one player is equipped with a newspaper from a fictional Canadian town, and the other player explores a papercraft version of this town in virtual reality. Please find the newspaper PDF in the game folder.
- This game is for two players: one with the newspaper, one playing VR.
- The game lasts about one hour, and is best played in local co-op with a speaker for both players to hear the audio.
- Be sure to communicate well with your partner to solve puzzles, discover character stories, and complete the game.
- VR player: In addition to teleporting, you can grab characters and move them around to solve puzzles.
- Newspaper player: The game was designed to be played with the newspaper player not seeing the game screen. However, if you prefer to have an easier time, you could check what the other player is seeing in VR.
Have fun in Smalltown!
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Created as a mixed media semester project at the Cologne Game Lab. Nominated for the Ubisoft Newcomer Award at the German Developer Awards 2020.
Game Discussion
Steam User 8
'Local Paper Small Town' is a very clever co-op game in which one person plays in VR and one (or more) reads the newspaper from the same "small town" in the real world. Movement is done via teleport with no other options and no turning, so you will need to play standing, or in a swivel chair. It is also worth noting that I used an Oculus Rift to play the game without issues. When it comes to the newspaper you need to read you can download this as a printable item to make it more fun, or you can simply view it as a PDF (but it is far more fun and easier to download and print out). With its cardboard cutout people and cartoon town, the game looks amazing and is full of lovely little things to find if you look in the right places. It's mostly about solving word puzzles and putting people in the right place, but there is a nice storyline to follow along with so you never really feel lost. But as it says at the start of the game communication is key.
It is worth noting that you will only play through once, but play with the right people/person and you will have a great laugh here. It reminds me a lot of 'Keep Talking and Nobody Explodes', only at a much slower, more relaxed pace. It looks good, has a great storyline and is great fun to play and as an extra bonus it is 100% free! But personally, I would have paid money to play this.
Steam User 4
This was a tiny gem of a game, with very clever co-op VR mechanics, quick little puzzles, good immersion (considering the concept of cut-out characters and a tiny town!), and a fun bit of indie rock.
Print out your newspaper and head into Smalltown. You won't regret it.
Steam User 7
Local Paper Small Town is a free VR 2-player co-op puzzle game about spreading happiness around a quirky papercraft town. It worked on my HTC Vive system, looked ok, played ok, sounded ok, was understandable. There is no background music, as far as i know. Needs someone else with you in room reading a newspaper to you, directing your actions in-game. Maybe you can use teamviewer program for someone to remotely be the newspaper person. The VR movement mode is Teleport.
This was a college coding course project. You have to get the PDF paper from the website on store page.
CONS: Does not work with Index controllers.
Try this game, if you like puzzles and local Co-Op games.
Steam User 0
Such a good game. We really enjoyed it.
It's intuitive but makes you think. Done within two hours with small breaks.
Steam User 0
Fun little free puzzle game.
Steam User 3
A fun, short experience and I'm glad I tried it! It's really fun to play with a close friend or significant other :)
Steam User 2
Before I played Local Paper Small Town, I had a small pp, no friends, no gf, depression, and no life. These things havent changed, but the game is pretty good