#talawa games

[gamesentral]

Unmechanical: Extended available now

Unmechanical: Extended available now

Grip Games has announced that adventure-puzzle game Unmechanical: Extended is available now.

The game was a collaboration between the aforementioned Grip, Talawa Games and Teotl Studios.

In Unmechanical, you play as a little robot that has been kidnapped into a strange underground complex and has to find his way out. On your…

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[jofjellsmediepedagogik]

En vän från waaay back in the days driver spelföretaget Talawa games tillsammans med några vänner. Dom har precis släppt spelet Peppy Pals till iOS som är ett EQ träningsspel för barn mellan 3 och 6 år. Denna genre tror jag kommer explodera om jag inte missat att den redan gjort det. Spelet går inte ut på att tävla utan snarare förstå andras känslor och på så sätt lösa problem. Spelet uppmärksammades igår på gomorron på SVT där det fick bra betyg och intressant feedback från en far som spelat barnet med sin son.

Länk till inslaget i gomorron Sverige 

Länk till officiell sida om spelet

[blinkyxx]

Talawa Games' Peppy Pals, the first of what is planned to be many in a series of entertaining and interactive titles for children ages 2-6, is now available to download on the App Store for iOS devices such as iPhones and iPads.

And I can announce that I am the voice of the Horse character!

If you have or know anyone that has young children, I would highly recommend getting this game for them. There will also be versions released for Android, PC, and Mac in the near future.

OFFICIAL WEBSITE

[steamgameaday]

Unmechanical (2012)

Genre: Adventure Puzzle Developer: Talawa Games Price: £6.99

Just when I thought I had finally gotten away from indie gaming clichés  what happens to turn up but another cute robot game, once again from indie developers and once again with physics puzzles. Also this one takes place in a weird, poorly constructed and fantastical mechanical robotic world, just in case you can't remember Machinarium. To be honest, some days I just don't know why I bother.

Unmechanical is about an "adorable but indifferent robot's quest to find its way out of the innards of an underground beast, and to find out what happened and why." Or at least that's what the official website says. Personally, having been through the game and seen both endings, I still have no bloody idea if there was supposed to be some kind of story or what any of it all means. Really, all you need to know is that you play a Cute Indie Robot™ which flies around a massive underground complex looking for a way to advance through each section through exploration and puzzle solving.

Built in the Unreal Engine, the whole things is a beautifully rendered 2D sidescroller based within a series of incredibly lit and richly detailed 3D environments. Unmechanical's complex is made up of twisty tubes and metal passages set in a dark and damp series of cave-like structures. Around you a mix of oppresive but slapdash-looking technology and the occasional bit of organic tissue mixed in for good, unsettling measure interweave into a series of weird ugly machines filled with puzzles and visually interesting setpieces. When combined with the eerie, slightly industrial soundtrack, the game evokes an eerie and mysterious atmosphere which draws the player in to the game's bizarre world.

But for all it's prettiness, Unmechanical does little to innovate. The puzzles have a tendency to fall back on tried and true traditional gameplay crutches, such as light-mirror puzzles, weighing down buttons with nearby objects and 'simon' style pattern repetition. The story has been purposefully left ambiguous and, therefore, is practically non-existent, and despite boasting "three hours" of content on it's website, the game actually lasts for around half of that. Certainly, I had completed the game with both endings in little under 2 hours, using just a few of the hints from the inbuilt system, and even then that included far more awkwardly backtracking whilst trying to find where to go next, finding, collecting and slowly carrying heavy items for fetch quests and waiting around for setpieces to end than I would personally would have liked.

And as for the plot? Well, without reading the official site, the game never actually gives you any sort of understanding of your little robot's motivations. There's no actual indication that it's an escape tale until you actually escape the complex. Assuming that you escape the complex at all, as there are two endings, neither of which you would naturally connect to the puzzle solution on offer. Ultimately, had I not read beforehand that there are two endings, I would have found myself confused and unsatisfied by what I would have seen as an ending with no narrative sense that seemingly comes out of nowhere.

But these are harsh words for a game that has, whilst not as much wit and charm as the similarly themed Machinarium, a great amount of style and atmosphere. Whilst the game doesn't really contain anything new, what it has it exercises well, and with it's short run-time, the game never really goes on long enough to outstay it's welcome. Ultimately Unmechanical is a fun way to spend a couple of hours, just don't expect an incredible mind-altering experience.

How long did I play? - 2.0 Hours Did I finish it? - Yes Would I play it again? - Yes

[bigfestival]

Unmechanical can be classified as “minimalistic”, but that’s diminishing its personality, which derives from details and subtleties. The game is nominated for three categories on BIG Festival: Best Visual, Best Sound and the grand prize of Best Game. Click here to read the interview with the game's team!

[bigentrevista]

Interview - Unmechanical

Unmechanical can be classified as "minimalistic", but that's diminishing its personality, which derives from details and subtleties. The game is nominated for three categories on BIG Festival: Best Visual, Best Sound and the grand prize of Best Game. For this interview, the game's team divided itself in order to respond each question with the most appropriate member. The respective names can be found at the end of each answer.

Unmechanical’s website describes Talawa Games as a former group of students with a cool project in its hands. So, how did this transition happen?

In February 2011, the students at a Swedish game development education called Futuregames received an assignment where they had to create a game/prototype using UDK and had roughly three weeks to do so. It was here that five of us created the first version of Unmechanical and would receive a heap of praise from it, which would incentivize us to make it into a commercial product.

In order to do so, we would need to bring in more people, but also set up our own company. This wasn’t something we had planned when we started with the game as most of us wanted to try our luck joining already established companies. Thankfully we had classmates who had plans to create their own company which we then struck a deal with. We’d make the game and we’d use their company to release it.

This was also something that we felt was a natural fit as some of the people already on the development team of Unmechanical were part of the group creating the company. Others in the Unmechanical group are either employed at different companies or are still looking for jobs in the industry. (André Axrud)

What was created first for Unmechanical? What was its initial concept?

Unmechanical was heavily shaped from the technical restriction that we received during the three week assignment and its initial concept is pretty much what the final product ended up being, from a gameplay perspective. The idea was to create a side-scrolling “helicopter” based puzzle/adventure game, in order to utilize and optimize our chances of actually being able to create something that would be impressive. After all we had just a little more than three weeks and we wanted to make something worthwhile, something that wasn’t just a throwaway but could actually be an experience. We achieved it by having few systems to create and polish, which would let us focus on getting a game that felt good playing and then the ability to control the amount of content to create based upon the time we had left. (André Axrud)

The visuals for Unmechanical remind me of 3D animation films and cartoons. Do you agree that this game has a more “cinematic” flair than most games, especially indie ones? Is this because the team originated from an Arts School, giving it a more artistic look?

This is quite an interesting question, but I would like to state that I see games such as Uncharted as something “cinematic”, and that was the opposite of what we wanted to create. We wanted to have as much interactivity and immersion as possible, letting the player have as much control as possible during the game and skip the notions of cut-scenes and other forms of narrative that removes the input from the player. So for us who made the game, “cinematic” sure is a strange word to use.

That said, the notion of being like a 3D animation is certainly interesting but I think that would be quite unintentional and most likely caused by the amazing character creation that we ended up with. Our little creation does have similar visual qualities as for example Wall-E and those are not uncommon in most 3D animated movies so I would guess that is what it comes from. The artistic look is also something that originated from the fact that we knew we wanted to make the game look unique and make sure it was recognizable from just a screenshot, so combining that desire with the technical restrictions and the story we had, it somehow ended up being what it became. (André Axrud)

The core gameplay is kind of minimalistic: you can move and grab things, basically. Do you feel that less is more in terms of gameplay? Was it done like this to ease the player into the game and help immersion?

The reason of the minimalistic core gameplay is because of what I stated above. It was part time restraint and part the desire to actually make something worthwhile. That meant we had to focus on a very defined gameplay system that would work, but wouldn’t take too much time to implement so we had time to create content that led people through a journey. A very short journey, but a journey none the less.

Do I feel that this is the way for all games to go? No. The core principles all developers should work for is to create an experience worthy to have and do whatever it takes to make sure everything in that experience are there to heighten it. So if a game demands hundreds of complex systems to make up the core mechanics in order to create the best experience possible, then it should have that. The real question is often about restrictions and time management.

It’s important to know what game you can make, and then make the game you want to make within those limitations. We could’ve added more complex gameplay mechanics once we went outside the initial school-assignment, but there really wasn’t any reason for it. The game actually required the minimalistic gameplay in order to give our players the experience we wanted them to achieve. The success we had with the game also affected us as it clearly showed we had something enjoyable, so why try fixing something that isn't broke? (André Axrud)

Would you say Unmechanical is more about the journey than pure gameplay? Why don’t we have more games this atmospheric?

I would say that a well designed and implemented gameplay mechanic creates the base for an enjoyable interactive journey. It’s hard to separate the idea of experience an interactive journey and the game mechanics as you use the mechanics to experience the journey. The question for me would rather be “is a complex gameplay system needed to create a worthy journey?” and that is of course not so. In fact a game like Unmechanical can bring the focus more on the journey as you’re paying more attention to the emotion that the game is trying to project, rather than having to deal with complex game mechanics that demands your attention.

The second question is a hard one, but my answer would be that we’re developing extremely short attention spans and a constant need for positive reinforcement that we get from the constant connectivity to the internet and the breakneck pace society is demanding. If you’re not given a pat on the back every 20 seconds, players today tend to lose interest and games that are more about the reward of experience an atmospheric journey just can’t compare to putting a player in a narrow feedback loop of positive reinforcement. In other words, they don’t sell. (André Axrud)

What was the biggest challenge while making the game?

Finishing it, which might sound as a cop out but it’s very true regardless. Any developer out there knows that it’s the last stretch that demands most work and is the time where the strangest and weirdest things bubble up to the surface which then have to be dealt with. (André Axrud)

Everyone seems to love the soundtrack for the game. What was it based on? It sounds very eerie, a bit scary and melancholic… was that the intention? Why?

The response to the soundtrack has been quite overwhelming, and I could not have dreamed of a better reception for my first OST.

The music borrows a lot of elements from the electroacoustic tradition, especially with regards to narrative. It thought it was important to tell, or at least suggest, a story while keeping the sounds static, minimal and ambient, as to not disturb the player. Regarding influence, the game itself was the only real inspiration. I joined the team when the art direction was already set, and the stream of ideas stemming from that was almost deafening. I simply used my knowledge to musically describe what was visually there. The results sonically I guess could be called Electro-organic, and the same could actually be said for the aesthetic profile of Unmechanical in general.

Eerie, a bit scary and melancholic are adjectives quite often used to describe the soundtrack, and I would say rightfully so. The three might not have been on my mind composing, however they to effectively summarize the whole experience. Again, some of it simply came with the territory. For the protagonist, it is not a joyful endeavor filled with fun quirky exploration and suggesting otherwise with the music would dispel the illusion and immersion that the team worked so hard to convey. The Unmechanical world is a mysterious one after all. There is a reason the protagonist remain completely indifferent throughout the game. To me, communicating that through a lonely synth lead was a given choice. We decided early to not have a standard leitmotif for the game, however these haunting melodies, melancholic chanting even, became the voice of a tiny machine in a vast abyss. (Jonas Kjellberg)

Is Talawa Games working on something new? What can we expect from now on?

Well, the main reason we got together and started our own studio was to create a healthy work environment. The industry tends to forget the importance of freedom in a creative job, alot of crunch and stress related drop offs and short employments are more common than not. We are now aiming to convert Unmechanical to iOS and at the same time we have several game pitches in the air to hopefully see one of them land and once again show the world that we are a force to reckon with! (Jesper Engström)

[bigentrevista]

Entrevista - Unmechanical

Unmechanical pode ser classificado como minimalista, mas denominá-lo assim é diminuir a personalidade desse jogo cuja força está nos detalhes e sutilezas. Ele está indicado a três categorias do BIG Festival: Melhor Arte, Melhor Som e o grande prêmio de Melhor Jogo. Para essa entrevista, a equipe do jogo se dividiu para que o membro mais pertinente respondesse a cada questão específica. Os nomes estão em parênteses ao fim de cada resposta.

O site de Unmechanical descreve a Talawa Games como um ex-grupo de estudantes com um projeto bacana em mãos. Como essa transição ocorreu?

Em fevereiro de 2011, os estudantes de uma escola Sueca de desenvolvimento de games chamada Futuregames recebeu uma tarefa em que deveriam criar um jogo/protótipo usando a UDK (Unreal Engine) e tinham cerca de três semanas para fazê-la. Foi assim que cinco de nós criamos a primeira versão de Unmechanical, que obteve muitos elogios e nos incentivou a fazer dela um produto comercial. Para isso precisaríamos não só de mais pessoas, mas também estabelecer nossa própria companhia. Não foi algo planejado quando começamos o jogo e a maioria de nós esperava tentar a sorte juntando-se a companhias já estabelecidas.

Por sorte, tínhamos colegas com planos de criar sua própria companhia, com os quais formamos um acordo. Nós faríamos o jogo e usaríamos a companhia deles para lançá-lo. Pareceu natural esse desenrolar, já que algumas das pessoas desenvolvendo Unmechanical também estavam no grupo criando a companhia. Outros no grupo de Unmechancial estão ou empregados em diferentes companhias ou ainda procurando empregos na indústria. (André Axrud)

O que foi criado primeiro em Unmechanical? Qual foi seu conceito original?

Unmechanical foi fortemente formatado a partir da restrição técnica que recebemos durante as três semanas da tarefa. Seu conceito inicial é basicamente o que o produto final se tornou, de uma perspectiva de gameplay. A ideia era criar um jogo de aventura e puzzle baseado em um “helicóptero” side-scroller, para otimizar nossas chances de criar algo impressionante. Afinal, tínhamos pouco mais do que três semanas e queríamos fazer algo válido, que não fosse descartável e sim uma verdadeira experiência. Alcançamos este objetivo por termos poucos sistemas para criar e polir, o que permitiu que focássemos em ter um jogo que fosse legal de jogar, e também que controlássemos o tanto de conteúdo que poderíamos produzir pelo tempo restante que tínhamos. (André Axrud)

O visual de Unmechanical me lembra filmes e cartoons em 3D. Vocês concordam que o jogo tem um apelo mais cinemático que a maioria, especialmente os indies? Isso se deve à origem do jogo ter acontecido em uma escola de artes, dando ele um visual mais artístico?

Essa é uma pergunta interessante, mas eu gostaria de dizer que chamo jogos como Uncharted de “cinemáticos”, e são o oposto do que queríamos criar. Nós queríamos ter tanta imersão e interatividade quanto possível, permitindo ao jogador manter o máximo de controle durante o jogo, dispensando a noção de cut-scenes e outras formas narrativas que removem a participação do jogador. Então, para nós que fizemos o jogo, “cinemático” é uma palavra estranha de se usar.

Dito isso, a noção de parecer uma animação 3D é interessante, mas acho que é bastante não intencional e causado pelo resultado final do design de personagens. Nossa pequena criação tem algumas qualidades visuais semelhantes a, por exemplo, Wall-E, e elas não são incomuns na maioria dos filmes animados 3D, então eu diria que é de onde essa impressão vem. O visual artístico também se originou do fato de que queríamos criar algo que parecesse único e ter certeza de que fosse reconhecível mesmo por uma única screenshot, então combinando esse desejo com a restrição técnica e história que tínhamos, acabou se tornando o que é. (André Axrud)

O gameplay central é, digamos, minimalista: você pode mover e agarrar coisas, basicamente. Você acha que menos é mais em termos de gameplay? Foi feito assim para facilitar a entrada do jogador e ajudar na imersão?

A razão do gameplay central minimalista é o que disse anteriormente: foi parte restrição de tempo e parte desejo de criar algo bem acabado, digno da atenção do jogador. Isso significa que tivemos que focar em um sistema de jogo muito bem definido e que funcionaria, mas que não levaria muito tempo para implementar, então tivemos que desenvolver conteúdo que levasse as pessoas em uma jornada. Uma jornada bem curta, mas ainda assim uma jornada.

Se eu acho que isso é o caminho para todos os jogos? Não. O princípios central que todos os desenvolvedores deveriam buscar é criar uma experiência válida e interessante na qual todos os elementos estão lá para intensificá-la. Então, se um jogo demanda centenas de sistemas complexos como mecânica central para criar a melhor experiência possível, você deve providenciar isso. A verdadeira questão é frequentemente sobre restrições e gerenciamento de tempo. É importante saber qual jogo você pode fazer, e aí fazer o jogo que gostaria dentro dessas limitações.

Nós poderíamos ter adicionado mecânicas de jogo mais complexas quando nos encontramos fora da tarefa escolar inicial, mas não havia nenhuma verdadeira razão pra isso. O jogo precisava desse gameplay minimalista para os jogadores terem a experiência que gostaríamos que tivessem. O sucesso que tivemos com o jogo também nos afetou no sentido de que claramente já tínhamos algo bacana, então por que tentar consertar algo que não está quebrado? (André Axrud)

Você diria que Unmechanical é mais sobre a jornada que puro gameplay? Por que não temos mais jogos tão atmosféricos?

 Eu diria que uma mecânica de gameplay bem desenvolvida e implementada cria a base para uma jornada interativa interessante. É difícil separar uma noção de jornada interativa das mecânicas de gameplay, se você tais mecânicas para experienciar essa jornada. A questão para mim seria “um sistema de gameplay complexo é necessário para criar uma jornada válida?”. Certamente, não é verdade. Unmechanical consegue focar a visão do jogador na jornada ao permitir que ele preste atenção na emoção que está sendo projetada, em vez de exigir mecânicas de jogo complexas que demandam sua atenção.

A segunda questão é difícil, mas minha resposta seria de que a sociedade vem focando em períodos de atenção muito curtos, com uma necessidade constante de feedback positivo que consegue através da constante conectividade à internet e do ritmo incessante que a realidade atual demanda. Se não recebem um tapinha nas costas a cada 20 segundos, jogadores tendem a perder interesse, e jogos que se tratam mais da recompensa pela experiência e jornadas atmosféricas  não se comparam  a  colocar o jogador nesse estreito loop de feedback e reforço positivo. Em outras palavras, eles não vendem. (André Axrud)

Qual foi o maior desafio ao fazer o jogo?

Terminá-lo, o que pode soar banal, mas não deixa de ser verdade. Qualquer desenvolvedor sabe que esse último momento é o que demanda mais trabalho, é a hora em que as coisas mais estranhas e esquisitas acontecem. (André Axrud)

Todos parecem amar a trilha sonora do jogo. Em quê ela foi baseada? Ela soa bem misteriosa, um pouco assustadora e melancólica... Essa foi a intenção? Por quê?

A reação à trilha sonora tem sido incrivelmente positiva, e eu não poderia estar mais feliz sendo esta minha primeira trilha.

A música se apropria de muitos elementos da tradição eletroacústica, especialmente com relação à narrativa. Pensei que era importante contar, ou ao menos sugerir, uma história enquanto mantinha os sons estáticos, mínimos e ambientais, para não incomodar o jogador. Com relação à influência, o jogo em si foi a única inspiração. Eu reuni o time quando a direção de arte já estava preparada, e o fluxo de ideias decorrentes dessa reunião foi quase ensurdecedor. Eu simplesmente utilizei meus conhecimentos pra descrever musicalmente o que eu estava visualizando.

Creio que os resultados de som podem ser chamados de “Eletro-orgânico”, e esse tipo de música pode na realidade ser usado pra descrever o perfil estético de Unmechanical em geral.

Misteriosa, um pouco assustadora e melancólica são adjetivos frequentemente utilizados para descrever a trilha sonora, e eu diria que eles fazem sentido. Os três adjetivos não estavam na minha mente enquanto eu estava compondo, entretanto eles resumem efetivamente toda a experiência. Mais uma vez, parte disso desenvolveu-se naturalmente. Para o protagonista, sua tarefa não é um esforço alegre, recheado de exploração divertida e curiosa. Sugerir algo assim com a música dispersaria a ilusão e a imersão que time trabalhou tanto para transmitir. O mundo de Unmechanical é um mistério, no fim das contas. Tem um motivo para o protagonista continuar completamente indiferente durante todo o jogo. Para mim, comunicar isso através de uma solitária batida repetida foi uma escolha óbvia. Concordamos desde cedo que o jogo não teria uma música tema; entretanto, essas melodias assombrosas e cantos melancólicos tornaram-se a voz de uma pequena máquina num vasto abismo. (Jonas Kjellberg)

A Talawa Games está trabalhando em algo novo? O que podemos esperar de vocês daqui pra frente?

Bem, o maior motivo pelo qual nos juntamos e começamos nosso próprio estúdio foi para criar um ambiente saudável de trabalho. A indústria tende a esquecer a importância da liberdade num trabalho criativo, muitos apertos e stress acontecem, e trabalhos curtos são mais comuns que nunca. Planejamos converter Unmechanical para iOS e, ao mesmo tempo, estamos jogando na mesa vários conceitos de jogos. Esperamos que um deles saia da mesa para a produção, e aí, mais uma vez, mostraremos a nossa força! (Jesper Engström)

[varewulf]

Unmechanical

The story behind how I found Unmechanical is really not very interesting. I saw mister John 'Totalbiscuit' Bain do a 'WTF is...' video of the game, and it looked fun. So I once again went to Gog.com the other day and found it for 9 bucks, so I figured I would give it a shot. I paid more for today's dinner, and that didn't entertain me for as long.

  Unmechanical is a 2.5D puzzle game. Pure and simple. There's no platforming, no combat, no dialogue and what little story there is never gets in the way of the puzzles. Development was done by Swedish studio Talawa Games, and it's actually their first game, which is rather impressive. Another Swedish studio called Teotl Studios (the people behind The Ball) helped them out. It is only out for PC at the moment, though they are planning an iOS port and the game is also on OnLive for any platform that can run that.

As usual, there will be minor story spoilers, though you'll have to figure out the puzzles on your own. 

The plot is minimalistic. You are a little floating robot-thing that is utterly adorable, can fly anywhere and use a small tractor beam to affect its surroundings. At the start of the game you are out flying with others of your kind when an arm comes out of the ground and grabs you. You fly through several tubes and see others similarly kidnapped before you crash into an underground lake which knocks you out. You wake up on the bank of the lake and the game clues you in to how the F1 key will give you a little hint.

  So adorable. And the water looks pretty good too.

No further explanation is given though, not even of the controls. So let me help you out there. To move around you can use WASD or the arrow keys. For some reason I couldn't move diagonally properly with the arrow keys on my keyboard, so I had to use WASD for full movement, and a few puzzles do require that. Spacebar or Left mouse button activates the tractor beam. It's only active for as long as you hold down the key/button.

As you traverse the world and solve the puzzles you will occasionally get insights into the world and its other inhabitants, even though they'll always be out of reach. And eventually you figure out why you and your kind have been kidnapped.

  I got one! This isn't the hardest puzzle, but it's still fun.

None of that truly matters though. What matters are the puzzles, of which there is a shocking amount of variety. There are all sorts of puzzles testing different things: logic, reasoning, memory, your grasp on physics, precision, speed and more. By making you largely invulnerable and having frequent checkpoints the game encourages you to experiment to your heart's delight. The game is only 3-4 hours long, and I kinda get the feeling that was the point where they ran out of puzzle ideas. The fact that there are so few similarities between the puzzles is quite frankly amazing though. Some of them build on what you've mastered earlier, but there is very little repetition.

The graphics are also rather astonishing. This game was built with the Unreal Development Kit, and it is simply beautiful. The lighting effects are excellent, the entire environment is incredibly detailed and well-crafted, and combined with the highly atmospheric music and nicely simple sound effects it creates a fascinating world that it's a shame they don't delve deeper into. I feel I should also mention that the game is locked at 60 FPS, for those of you that care about such.

  Now what is it they're after here?

The game physics also feel really good. On its own the little adore-bot will just float in position effortlessly, but as soon as you lift something up you will have to keep correcting because the item will drag you down towards the ground. Things behave as you expect them to, and that certainly helps the immersion. 

I'd be awfully remiss if I did this entire review without mentioning the balls. From the moment I found my first one I was all 'ooooooo shiny!' and I wanted to never part with it. I happily did whatever it took to bring it with me to the next part of the game. Whenever one was taken from me I was outraged. I guess they felt like friendly company in a dark and lonely world. It got quite eerie down there from time to time.

  That thing took my ball! And it won't give it back!

And then there is the one part where you upgrade the robot. For a moment there I thought that would lead into a metroidvania thing, but that was the only time, really. It was a good upgrade, but it feels like something they intended to have more of, but then changed their minds (or ran out of time/money). The fact that some of the music felt very Metroid Prime might have tinted my expectations.

I did find it interesting that they actually decided to include two different endings. They don't really do much with either ending, but they both have interesting implications.

Now what could have been done better? Well, any explanation of the controls would have been good. There's nowhere you can look them up, and rebinding keys is completely out of the question. I had to guess based on my knowledge of videogame standards, and though I was right that doesn't speak well for anyone not familiar with videogames trying this out without anyone to explain things for them. I did run into a few minor graphical bugs and the occasional place where the physics spazzed out, but nothing that ruined any of the puzzles. And I wouldn't have minded a little more insight into the world we're traveling through. What we got was sorta intriguing, but felt a little shallow.

  This is the entire options menu.

What it boils down to is this: If you like puzzles, I would highly recommend you check this game out. If you don't like puzzles, or if you're looking for a deep story, this is not the game for you. Everything is told through the environment, be it the story or any hints the game gives you besides the F1 function. It follows the 'show, don't tell' rule religiously. It is, in short: A very good puzzle game.

At a mere $10 as it costs as of this writing it certainly won't put you far back, but if you're still in doubt, there is a demo.

~Wulf