In the world of Entropy, there’s not much in the way of hand-holding when it comes to figuring out what is supposed to be done and how it’s supposed to be accomplished. Because the story begins with the limited explanation that something ‘strange’ happened, it’s no surprise that the character’s identity, purpose, and abilities are also kept a mystery. The first-person view helps further that mystery by obscuring the view of what sort of entity the player is. I don’t always enjoy games that leave the player to figure out what the hell’s going on, but the dark and mysterious atmosphere made it seem like a good fit in this instance. A shining amoeba-like creature casually draws the player in the direction they must go, but the path is typically blocked. By unlocking the opening to the next area, the game fairly literally leads the player further down the rabbit hole as he/she drops down a shaft to continue. It’s enough to make one feel claustrophobic and there’s no way to tell whether the player is ultimately making their way into or out of the unknown structure.

The puzzles get tougher as you head further down the rabbit hole

In order to gain access to the next area, the solution generally involves powering up energy conduits that line the walls. How this is accomplished is through orbs found throughout the levels. These orbs might be made of water, fire, and other basic elements. The non-lethal variety can be moved by making contact with them. The deadly ones can be moved through use of a gravity bubble gun that pulls all orbs within its reach to the center of the field. Sometimes the conduits are powered up by piling orbs onto a massive scale that measures weight, pH levels, or temperature. In some instances, the player simply has to figure out a way to draw electricity from an active conduit towards one that’s inactive. The most help players will typically get is an occasional image projected onto the walls that gives a subtle hint about which direction to go or if there’s a nearby danger. It’s refreshing to see a game not give away the most basic of  solutions. It’s through experimentation that lessons are learned about the effects when the elemental orbs come into contact with one another. For example, douse a fire orb with enough water orbs and it turns to stone. Where Portal is generally considered a physics sandbox, Entropy combines physics with a dose of chemistry.

Strong enough for a man…

While discovery of both purpose and means is arguably the strongest facet of Entropy, the graphical prowess is also worth a mention. While I’m not a fan of throwing down the “for an XBLIG” caveat, Entropy really does look great for an XBLIG title. While the engine can chug a bit now and then, the dark environments contrast well with the vibrant, elemental orbs with all of it looking sharp. It’s a true rarity to see an Xbox indie studio successfully pull off a great-looking 3D environment, so kudos to Autotivity.

While Entropy does a decent job of introducing new gameplay twists every once in awhile, it’s not the kind of game that’s going to be fun for long play sessions. Many of the puzzles require precision in how you direct the orbs around hazards as well as some timing in instances where you’re suspending them over pits or open space. That level of exactness can wear on the player over time. As with a number of the puzzle games we’ve reviewed, Entropy is best enjoyed in small doses. Thankfully it’s also the kind of game that’s easy to come back to without having to get reacclimated. In fact, I took almost a month off from playing the game and had zero issues jumping right back in.

Entropy is another worthy entry in the lineup of XBLIG puzzle titles. While comparisons to Portal are inescapable, fans of that series are likely to enjoy the physics and chemistry-based fun that’s to be had. Although the game lacks the humor and character of its mainstream brother, the shrouded atmosphere is certainly worthy of a look. The puzzles themselves run the gamut from easy to pretty difficult, and only once or twice did I find myself getting really frustrated. The ever present ability to rewind time is a tool that will get a lot of use and certainly helps keep that irritation level down. Players can even skip levels if they want to. It’s inclusions like these that give the game a bit of polish, elevating it above many of its peers on the XBLIG service. Entropy is currently available in the Xbox Marketplace for 80 MSP ($1).

Overall Rating: ★★★★☆ 

Review on theXBLIG.com

Review on Indie Gamer Chick

Review on Clearance Bin Review

© 2012 – 2013, The Indie Mine. All rights reserved.

In Pixel, players are challenged on each level to make it from the starting position to an end gate as fast as possible. In order to reach that destination, the platforms and columns around the player must be manipulated using a multi-purpose gun. Shooting some columns with your standard gun ability will cause those cubes to temporarily slide in one direction, giving the player a new path to travel down. Some paths are constantly moving,  but can be slowed down using a special gun attachment. Other areas serve as launch pads that send the player flying through the air towards doom or glory. Certain platforms will only start moving once the player connects two nodes using yet another gun attachment. There’s a lot of variety to what the player can accomplish using their Swiss Army gun, and the game does a great job in terms of pacing when doling out new abilities or platform types. Each of these is introduced just as the previous one has been fully explored. In all, there are a couple dozen levels with the latter ones requiring players to use more than one of the abilities at their disposal.

While playing Pixel I was reminded of my experiences playing T.E.C. 3001 during last year’s Indie Games Uprising even,t or the various titles in the Super Monkey Ball franchise. Even though they are games with completely different themes, all of them challenge players to find the quickest path to the end of the stage. While racing the clock, the urge to keep plowing forward has the ability to lure the player into a bad situation. Sometimes when trying to be fast, the best thing a person can do is slow down and get a better view of what he or she is speeding into. That being said, there’s nothing quite so exhilarating within a platformer as just squeaking past a moving obstacle or nailing an impromptu leap all at breakneck speed. A smart decision by the developer was making sure everyone can get right back into the action when dying by dropping the player back at the start of the level without the need to acknowledge a retry prompt.

Sadly, there are a number of issues that rear their ugly heads throughout the game. Jumping a gap will often look like it’s going to succeed only for you to clip through a column or seemingly bounce off to the side of your intended landing spot. Sometimes firing your cannon at a cube beside you will send you careening off to your death, while performing the same action on an identical formation elsewhere won’t have that undesired effect. Pixel ends up being as much a guessing game as it is a platformer. For players with the patience of a saint, some of the hiccups can be worked around once they’re learned. This repeated trial and error of working through the game’s bugginess isn’t a big deal on the shorter levels. There are a few levels, though, where painstakingly creeping towards the goal only to be undone by one of these issues will likely result in a steady stream of profanities. I know it did for me. It’s a shame because when it does work, it’s actually a really fun game.

The other issue with the game is the camera. The first-person view just doesn’t feel right. Other reviewers have complained about the gun taking up too much of the screen real estate, but my biggest beef with the camera is that it’s just too close to the action. Navigating on small ledges and around tight corners causes undue grief with the camera zoomed in. It’s much harder to tell where the player is going to land when jumping, and that problem is only compounded by the aforementioned clipping issues. I understand that pulling the view out into 3rd-person would make the shooting aspect more difficult, but there has to be some kind of happy medium.

Players may find the first-person camera too close for comfort when navigating levels

It’s a shame that the execution fell through on Pixel, because there were a number of things that were done right. The cel-shaded art style is simplistic, but it fits. Using the gun to trigger changes in the levels is fun to play with, though I wish it had been taken further. The bugs can’t be overlooked, however, because even though this game combines multiple genre elements, it’s platforming that dominates. While changing the camera at this point might be too radical of a change, going forward I would hope that at least the clipping issues get fixed. That would certainly go a long way towards restoring the joy that is supposed to go hand-in-hand with playing a game. Unfortunately, Pixel as it exists right now is an unsatisfying platforming experience for the two to four hours it’ll likely take most players to complete it.

Overall Rating: ★★☆☆☆ 

Additional Pixel coverage:

Review on Clearance Bin Review

Review on theXBLIG.com

Review on Indie Gamer Chick

© 2012 – 2013, The Indie Mine. All rights reserved.

By now much of the gaming world has experienced all of the wonder that the Portal series has brought to the industry. Developer David Johnson of Smudged Cat Games takes inspiration from those fun physics-based puzzles and quite literally turns them on their heads. SPOILER ALERT: Taking on the role of a scientist stuck trying to escape his own lab, players unlock additional guns that allow them to change their character’s size, repeatedly travel back and forth between time, and change the orientation of the game world. The first and last of those guns are fairly intuitive once experimented with a couple of times. On the flip side, the time travel gun really takes some getting used to. The same people who skip through EULAs and never read the fine print are the ones that are going to run into trouble.  With all of its nuances, time travel in Gateways is not the easiest concept to wrap one’s mind around. It took me reading the multi-page help menu explanation before it finally clicked. The application of this one gun alone probably make it worthy of its own game. When combined with the abilities of the other guns, there’s really an amazing amount of reality-bending power at the player’s disposal.

The game is structured in a Metroidvania style, with new powers and abilities helping the player open previously impassable doors. One of the niceties in Gateways is that shortcuts can be opened up within the lab that allow the player to quickly travel back to the earlier areas almost in a hub-like design. At times though, it’s easy to feel lost if you don’t know about the existence of the overworld map. I’d played through a good portion of the game before realizing it was there, which would have saved me a lot of time. Having that map at my disposal definitely changed my overall opinion of the game. Backtracking can get a little tedious, especially if you have to repeatedly perform the same series of death-defying feats to reach a particular room. But as long as players use the map to get a general feel for where to go next, they should easily avoid some of the headaches I ran into.

The difficulty of the puzzles later on can get a bit frustrating. Smudged Cat even released an update that allows players to select a ‘Normal’ mode to tone things down a bit. I never got to the point where I threw down the controller in disgust, but there were times where I certainly recognized that saving the game, walking away, and coming back with a fresh mind was the way to go. One of the smart design choices was to only allow a single gun to be used in solving the first 90% or so of the puzzles. Otherwise, it would’ve been far too daunting a task to figure out which guns to whip out and in what order. However, late in the game the rules change such that you’re going to need to use multiple guns in sequence to solve getting through some of the doors. Most of these really tough puzzles can be solved with patience and determination, but even I had to eventually throw in the towel and either search for a solution online or purchase the answer using orbs collected in-game. Difficulty is always a subjective quality to judge, but I honestly feel like Smudged Cat was trying a bit too hard to boggle our minds. As a reviewer, it was a bit stressful trying to hurry towards a solution, but gamers taking on the challenge at a more casual pace will likely appreciate the pacing and challenge more. Overall I felt like the quality of the puzzles is not only great for an indie game, but puts it right on par with the best to be found in the entire video game industry. With only a few exceptions, they’re that good and that fun and certainly elicit that ‘a-ha!’ moment when solved.

Gateways is not all about the puzzles. There is a light amount of platforming, but a good portion of it takes place in between unlocking doors to new areas, rather than being central to the puzzles themselves. There are, of course, exceptions particularly when dodging one’s own clones in a time-travel solution or when changing the orientation of the lab. I thought this aspect of the game was very well done, especially with the feel of jumping. The right flightiness of jumping is not something that every XBLIG manages to nail, but the developer was successful here.

As with all of the other Smudged Cat titles I’ve played, there’s a high level of refinement in the presentation. Yes, the visual quality is, for better or worse, decidedly retro. However, the music is atmospheric, the menu system intuitive, and the help very… helpful. I mentioned before that there’s a great series of instructions in the help system for how each of the guns work, and I would consider it a must-read. The visual effects produced by opening the different gateways provide that same wonder first experienced with Portal. Though lower-res, I think it is even more awe-inspiring here when you can see clones of yourself running around in different stages of time traveling.  It’s easy to tell from the way the whole package is put together that Smudged Cat has been down this road before and learned a thing or two about how to assemble a finished product. That’s something that’s usually lacking on the XBLIG service.

The effects seen by approaching open gateways provide a cool, visual treat

Gateways not a perfect game, but it really raises the bar for what puzzle games on XBLIG should aim for. I lost count of how many times I thought to myself “What a wonderfully crafted puzzle, you tricky bastard.” A lot of people are going to draw the obvious comparisons between Gateways and Portal including me in this very article. In its own indie way Gateways goes on to do so much more. Perhaps the best praise I can heap upon this title is to say that it wouldn’t surprise me to start seeing Gateways-inspired titles start to pop up in the near future. Despite some gripes about the difficulty, I can say with full confidence that I consider it a polished gem, and I believe most players will agree.

Overall Rating: ★★★★★ 

Note: This review was conducted using version 1.11 of the game.

Additional Gateways coverage:

Review on theXBLIG.com

Review on Indie Gamer Chick

Review on Clearance Bin Review
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© 2012 – 2013, The Indie Mine. All rights reserved.

Our parade of interviews with Indie Games Uprising developers continues. In this installment we talk with Alex from Autotivity Entertainment. Autotivity has developed Entropy, a game sure to entertain fans of physics-based puzzle games. Check out the interview below for information on Entropy and development advice direct from Aristotle.

Alex you are here representing Autotivity, the developers behind the XBLIG game Entropy. Can you tell us a bit about your studio in terms of how you got started and where you are now? Your staff more than doubled in size during development.

Autotivity is a name we picked because DBP demanded a team name so we have no glorious history to share tales on. In the beginning there were two of us (programmers both), but later on we were joined by five very motivated people who helped us finish Entropy for the Uprising (turned out you actually need artists for proper game graphics, having 3d graphics and physics programmers alone is not sufficient.)

You were accepted into Dream.Build.Play, and now you’ve been asked to participate in the Indie Games Uprising. What’s been the reaction from the staff? Is everyone stressed out by meeting deadlines, or is everyone really excited?

My co-workers and I had a lot of pressure in the last weeks as this is not the only project we’re involved with and even though rapidly approaching deadlines are good for actually finishing stuff, the pressure on our real-life has been high. I don’t think there will be much excitement until we have the game released.

Let’s dig into discussing Entropy. I’m a big fan of physics-based puzzle games and I know there are thousands, maybe millions, of other people out there who feel the same. Can you tell us what Entropy is all about?

It’s about physical interactions between different kinds of matter, set within a mystery world with lots of hidden stuff to discover. Roughly speaking, the world we built for the XBLIG community is a cave garden that happens to be populated by lava, acid, heavy stone balls, electric conductors – and you have to combine all these components to get forward. The interesting part is that most puzzles must be solved indirectly (obviously, all this stuff is really dangerous!). Be careful, you’re not alone down there!In one of the first levels, our first-person player (who initially doesn’t know who he is) gets a “weapon” that produces gravity bubbles, which stay alive for a while and push all movable matter within their range towards their center. The later levels are based on tilting entire chambers.

There’s some 3D platforming involved as well.

It’s really difficult to explain how this all comes together, you should check out our release trailer (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V8CMSrfBBaU) to get a feeling for what to expect.

The elements factor heavily into Entropy‘s puzzles

What games, if any, inspired Entropy?

Portal. In the beginning we were scared about being a fake Portal ripoff because everybody whom we talked to about the game concept would mention the ‘P’ word somewhere. Now that the game is finished we can safely say that Entropy is totally, absolutely different than Portal – still Portal‘s puzzle design somehow inspired the game and even though you don’t carry a gun in Entropy the gravity device you use bears some very vague resemblance to the Portal Gun.

Rumors are there is even cake in the game.

(Braid, even though it too has the time shift feature, was not an inspiration, none of us had played it.)

What games in general have inspired you to become a developer?

On this question I can only speak for myself. I don’t think computer games ever inspired me to become a software developer (there’s so much out there that is more or at least as fascinating than games), but they inspired me to delve into 3D graphics programming. Noteworthy titles include Half Life 2 and, later, Crysis.

What do you consider your favorite part or element of Entropy? Is there anything that’s not going to make the cut that you wish would?

In Entropy you can always go back in time. Time shift is easily accessible on the left trigger so it integrates smoothly into the gameplay.

I really LOVE this feature. It’s so fun to be able to burn half the scene (for fun … or by accident) and to watch it play back in real-time.

Earlier you mentioned the need to bring in artists to help on the project. What’s been the most difficult part of the game development process for you and your team?

Organizing the whole thing. Entropy is a medium-sized software project running on two platforms doing non-trivial stuff and being developed on by multiple developers. This alone is a nightmare to manage. Add the need to communicate with artists and to schedule their work, too, to the pot and it gets even worse.

I think the most difficult aspect on game development is that you not only need to get a software project done, but you also need to do well on non-quantifyable scales such as artistic aspects or plain “fun”.

This way to physics-based fun

What do you feel is the best part about being an indie developer?

It’s difficult for me to respond to this – we’re Indie developers by accident and we don’t need to earn our living with it. In fact we don’t need money at all (even though we’d be glad to get our development costs back).

So in our case, we were just writing the game we would like to play ourselves, with no pressure and full freedom to do what we had in mind.

I doubt the experience remains as pleasant as soon as you need to get something in return.

Are there any aspirations to do this kind of development full-time?

No to Indie development as a fulltime job. But I can definitely imagine it as a hobby.

What advice would you give to other developers out there just starting out?

I’ll go with Aristotle and say that to begin  is more important than everything else. You’ll probably do 100 of the 10000 things you have in your mind to achieve in your life – or zero (as in zero) if you don’t start. So go ahead and start doing something. Sticking to it is the next obstacle, but to start comes first.

Before we go, let’s get back to Entropy for just a moment.  Can you tell our readers what kind of experience they can expect playing your game, and why they should give it a try?

You will be exploring a very fascinating and beautiful 3D world in which there is lots to discover. You will be solving puzzles that are not overly difficult but totally different to all 3D puzzlers you’ve seen before. Did I mention you can play with fire in the game?

Additional coverage of Entropy:

Prelude to the Uprising: Entropy on theXBLIG.com

© 2012 – 2013, The Indie Mine. All rights reserved.

A veteran XBLIG and PC developer with a handful of titles to his name, David Johnston is the man behind Smudged Cat Games. Smudged Cat’s puzzle platformer Gateways is one of this year’s entries selected for the Indie Games Uprising. In this interview, David talks to us about his latest title, developing for XBLIG, and the lessons that all new developers must learn.

David, congratulations on being selected for this year’s XBLIG Uprising event. How familiar were you with the previous incarnations, and were you surprised to be chosen?

Thanks!  I was certainly aware of the previous Uprisings and always really wanted to be a part of one but my previous games were never due to be released around the right time.  I’m really happy that people have seen the potential in Gateways and it was picked for the Uprising from the many great releases coming out.  I’ve always thought Gateways was quite a unique game that could fit well into an Uprising.

Your latest game, Gateways, was chosen after being released earlier this year on PC. What made you decide to port it to Xbox Live Indie Games?

It’s a bit of a no-brainer really.  The game has been written using XNA so porting it between the PC and XBox is fairly straightforward.  I’ve actually been developing the PC and Xbox versions in tandem as I’ve been going along as I was always planning to release for both platforms.  I’m interested to see how the game fares on XBLIG as it’s the first large scale game I’ve released on the platform.  My other games like A Bomb’s Way, Time Slip and Growing Pains have all been quite small bite-sized games.

I know some comparisons have been drawn between this title and Portal. Can you expand on that a bit by telling our readers what Gateways is all about?

I’m guilty myself of comparing the game to Portal because it’s the quickest way to get the general gist of the game across.  It goes well beyond Portal though by adding different types of guns that give you powers beyond just travelling from one place to another.  You find a gateway gun that lets you put down 2 different sized gateways.  By traveling through the small one you emerge out of the large one at twice your normal size and going the other way shrinks you down.  Another gateway gun lets you adjust gravity and the final one lets you travel back in time.

The structure of the game is very different as well.  Gateways takes place in a single large map which you gain access to parts of by acquiring the different types of gateway guns and other power ups.  There are no loading screens between areas of the map, the whole thing is one giant level that you are free to roam around in.  I’ve also implemented a help system so that if you get completely stuck at any part of the game you can actually buy a solution using the in-game currency.

No, that’s not a glitch. Gateways is all about mind-bending puzzles.

Sounds like you’ve got a bit of Metroidvania going there. The large-scale map also sounds reminiscent of Growing Pains which was actually the first Smudged Cat title I’d played. I really enjoyed how that level design was presented to the player, the growing mechanic, and the online leaderboards. It’s been awhile since that title was released, so you’ve probably had some time to reflect. In what ways do you consider it a success?

Growing Pains was actually a bit of a diversion while I was working on Gateways. I’d been playing with Gateways for so long that I really wanted to work on something different for a bit of a change. I had the idea of a continually growing character and decided to put together a prototype. I really liked the way it worked so decided to make a few levels and release it as a game. It’s the only game I haven’t worked with an artist on, all the graphics are vector based and generated in-game. I needed something a bit different anyway because of the way the map scales so I used fractals for rendering the walls which produces a nice effect when zooming out. I’m really happy with the way the whole game worked out.

I know that we, like other sites that cover XBLIG, would consider you an XBLIG veteran due to the fact that you’ve released a variety of titles on the platform. Most of these have met with critical, if not always commercial success. What is it that keeps you developing for the platform and how/why did you get started on it?

I started using XNA (the framework used for XBLIG games) before it was actually possible to release games for the Xbox with it. I could see that at some point Microsoft were going to allow indie developers to release games for the Xbox and thought it would be a really great opportunity. I was right about being able to release games for the Xbox but perhaps not so right about it being a great opportunity. I know some games have done really well but I haven’t really had the kind of response I was hoping for from the platform. I’m not sure if I’ll be using XNA for my next project.

What are some of the lessons you’ve learned about indie development through the process of creating all of these titles?

I’ve really learned the importance of trying to promote your game as much as possible. It’s no good just releasing a game and hoping for the best. It doesn’t matter how good your game is, if people don’t hear about it then no-one is going to play it. There are plenty of technical things I’ve learned as I’ve gone along as well. With every new game you learn from past mistakes and get more and more refined in how you implement games. It’s not the sort of thing you can really teach people, it just comes with practice and, like everything else in life, you get better over time.

I know Gateways isn’t out yet, but have you started thinking about what your next project will be? Is it time for some time off, or is there something you’re already planning and are willing to talk about?

I honestly don’t have another project in mind yet.  I recently released The Adventures of Shuggy on PC and have been thinking about making some new levels for that.  I’m going to concentrate on supporting Adventures of Shuggy and Gateways and perhaps think about porting them to other platforms before starting something new.  It’s always tempting to jump into a new project when a new idea excites you but I want to make sure I provide proper support for Gateways and make the most of it before moving on.

The Adventures of Shuggy has made its way onto both the Xbox and Steam

Are there other games on the XBLIG platform you’ve either enjoyed or been inspired by?

I really enjoyed Clover when it came out but that was a while ago now.  The most recent game I bought was P-3 Biotic which was a fun twin stick shooter.  To be honest I’ve not had much time to play any kind of game recently, whether it’s AAA, XBLA or XBLIG.  Once Gateways is out there and things die down a bit I’ll try and catch up with the games that I’ve missed recently.

Before we go, let’s hear your pitch for Gateways. Who do you think will enjoy the game, and why should everyone give it a try?

I think Gateways will appeal to people looking for some great puzzles rather than fast-paced action.  You can take as long as you like in Gateways to explore the map and uncover areas you previously missed, there’s no time limit or anything pressuring you to finish.  It’s been designed to be played at a leisurely pace allowing you to sit back and contemplate the power that’s been given to you with the different Gateways guns.  It’s the type of game that I enjoy playing so I hope it’s the type of game that other people will enjoy playing as well.

Additional press coverage:

Clearance Bin Review – XBLIG Uprising Preview: “Portal” turned upside-sideways = “Gateways”

© 2012 – 2013, The Indie Mine. All rights reserved.

Smudged Cat Games’ quirky spin on Portal has finally released. Gateways has wrapped up the beta process and flown the coop. There’s an updated demo available, and if it tickles your brain the right away you can purchase the full game for just $10 through the official website. Gamers waiting for Gateways on XBLIG are going to have to wait a bit as the developers have announced that version won’t be coming until later this year.

Check out the trailer and full press release below for more details on Gateways.

© 2012 – 2013, The Indie Mine. All rights reserved.

Reflexio

The objective is in Reflexio is fairly simple. Playing as Joey the koala, the goal is to collect the zippers scattered around each stage that will open a door to the next level. The hook to the game is the aforementioned ability to manipulate the world. Certain points along the edge of the board indicate axes over which players can reflect most elements on the stage. Joey stays in place while zippers, the exit, and blocks or spikes are flipped across the chosen axis. The player can also move Joey around the stage with simple left, right, and jump controls. Timing jumps so that the player performs a reflection in mid-air and lands on a platform that wasn’t there when the jump was started is perhaps the gameplay element where the most fun can be found. It can also take the longest to get used to.

The game does a great job with scaling the difficulty level and gameplay twists introduced. The early stages act as a kind of tutorial introducing one new element a time. Vertical, horizontal, and diagonal axes become standard across most stages. Then the player is introduced to blocks that are immune to the reflective mechanic. A moveable box and the ability to open up new axes through puzzle elements are eventually introduced later on. For about 2/3 of the game, there are a number of moments I found myself saying something to the effect of “Ooh, that was clever” and giving the developers a virtual high-five. These moments would compare favorably to those experienced while playing Portal and other titles that include puzzles combining platforming, timing, and creative solutions.

Reflexio starts inauspiciously and gradually ramps up the difficulty on players

Some of the later stages I found a little too tedious in that it becomes necessary to meticulously count blocks and spacing in anticipation of not getting crushed when performing the next reflection. Some stages require a couple dozen of these situations and should the player mess up once, he/she will have to start completely over. It’s not expected for the player to make it through all stages in one or even half a dozen tries. In fact, the built-in achievement system includes a few goals related to how many times and ways you fail. It never gets to the point where the player is likely to exit the game in frustration, but it can damper the experience just a bit.

The presentation of the game is something of a quandary. It’s definitely family-friendly in its backgrounds, character design, and music. It has the potential to be a little off-putting for older gamers, but after a few stages it’s unlikely players will even notice it anymore. It’s certainly no reason to not play a game that has the kind of puzzles that will tickle brains of all ages.

Timing and planning are key in solving Reflexio’s multi-dimensional puzzles

Reflexio is a great example of a simple premise combined with solid execution. Its looks may be sugar-coated but the foundation is likely to please all gamers that enjoy exercising their mind. While the experience won’t last for more than a few hours for the saavy puzzler, I wholeheartedly recommend it. There’s a demo available for download, and should players wish to purchase the game, it’s selling through the studio’s website, Desura, and IndieCity.

Overall Rating: ★★★★☆ 

This game was reviewed using a copy provided by the developer for that purpose.

© 2012 – 2013, The Indie Mine. All rights reserved.