OK, so your job should you chose to accept it is to finish reading this article and then, if you don't already own it, go buy 'Limbo'
a black and white puzzle-platformer on XBLA, PSN and PC. While I am well aware that I am a bit late to the party (game was released in 2010) in heaping critical praise onto this game I feel the need to do so anyway as it has been a long time since I've played a game like this. In short a game that provided an interesting (understatement) experience while also managing to avoid any significant screw-ups on the gameplay end. It manages to be artistically interesting with a very unique visual style without interfering that with gameplay ('El Shaddai'
* had issues with this). It also has a reasonably approachable difficulty curve in its puzzles such that you shouldn't find yourself completely lost for a solution and ready to throw your controller of choice against a wall.
a black and white puzzle-platformer on XBLA, PSN and PC. While I am well aware that I am a bit late to the party (game was released in 2010) in heaping critical praise onto this game I feel the need to do so anyway as it has been a long time since I've played a game like this. In short a game that provided an interesting (understatement) experience while also managing to avoid any significant screw-ups on the gameplay end. It manages to be artistically interesting with a very unique visual style without interfering that with gameplay ('El Shaddai'* had issues with this). It also has a reasonably approachable difficulty curve in its puzzles such that you shouldn't find yourself completely lost for a solution and ready to throw your controller of choice against a wall.In 'Limbo' you play a small boy who, according to the games tagline (and only real direct storytelling), is searching for his sister. Is he dead? Is she dead? Are they both dead? Neither? Something else? These and many others are all questions that the game leaves up to the players interpretation. It further reinforces this ambiguity as you move through the environments with a forest filled with horrible things giving way to industrial environments filled with more subtly horrible things. It does all of this with an incredible attention to detail and a complete absence of hand holding tutorials. A perfectly minimalist experience.
you play a small boy who, according to the games tagline (and only real direct storytelling), is searching for his sister. Is he dead? Is she dead? Are they both dead? Neither? Something else? These and many others are all questions that the game leaves up to the players interpretation. It further reinforces this ambiguity as you move through the environments with a forest filled with horrible things giving way to industrial environments filled with more subtly horrible things. It does all of this with an incredible attention to detail and a complete absence of hand holding tutorials. A perfectly minimalist experience.My only complaint about the game was that a couple of its timed puzzles where more than a tad on the obnoxious side. The problem I ran into was that while the solution was (usually) pretty obvious actually sticking the landing was more a matter of trial and error (seemingly) than of knowledge or skill. Oops, you where off by .02 of a second back to the checkpoint. Admittedly isn't much of a setback as the game saves quite often (which given how often it kills you is definitely a good thing) but it still kind of irritating. That's it. That's my only issue with the game. Also it isn't like there's a great abundance of puzzles like this (maybe 2 or 3 in the entire game).
Hopefully you made it through this review even though it's probably not one of my better ones. The issue here is describing something that I want to praise but also something that is better experienced for oneself. Which hopefully anyone reading this who hasn't already played it goes ahead and does. See you all next week.
*What I'm referring to here is that occasionally the game goes all artsy on the player and in doing so makes the actual gameplay more difficult. This could be something as simple as color choices making it difficult to differentiate enemies from the background (beautiful though the background may be) to going for a more pleasing scenic view at the expense of proper perspective needed to gauge ones jumps.
*What I'm referring to here is that occasionally the game goes all artsy on the player and in doing so makes the actual gameplay more difficult. This could be something as simple as color choices making it difficult to differentiate enemies from the background (beautiful though the background may be) to going for a more pleasing scenic view at the expense of proper perspective needed to gauge ones jumps.
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