Reviews

5 One word: Awestruck
This simply one of the best games I have ever played. period.

The Story is simple and sweet, but is revealed very gradually. There is no dialogue or text at all in this game (at least, in a language understandable to humans) The entire story is narrated in-game, and through weird graphic symbols and thought bubbles.

The Visuals are great and the artwork is incredibly detailed. The world the game-makers have created is simply amazing, and gives an eerie and dystopian backdrop to an otherwise light-hearted game. If there is flaw, with the graphics, it is the fact that the game resolution is limited to a maximum of 1200×800px.

The Soundtrack is some of the most original music i have ever heard, and succeeds spectacularly in setting the mood and ambiance of each level and the game as a whole.

The Puzzles are the real treat in this game. Most hit games of a similar genre are built around one good idea for a puzzle.(think World of Goo, Cut the rope, etc.) Machinarium has one for each level in this game. Really, the originality and sheer imagination put into some of the puzzles is hard to overstate. Make no mistake. This is a hard game, and the puzzles are very challenging. But the rewards for passing are correspondingly satisfying. The hints provided become vaguer and less useful as the game progresses. (I wouldn’t allow myself to use the hints or walkthrough even when i got stuck.)

Word of advice. The first two or three levels can be a show-stopper for most people. But if you pass through those, the best parts of the game are yet to come, with each stage being better than the last.

In conclusion, This a definite must-have. More importantly, the effort and patience put to get through those first 2 or 3 stages will be amply rewarded once you get into the groove of the game.

1 BORING!
This game does note make sense; I can’t manage to get to the next level, and also, the instructions are just terrible. All I can say is, don’t play this game!

1 Terrible.
Crane Wars is such an unfitting name for the game. Why can’t I just simply destroy, rather than build with such terrible controls? All I can say is, DON’T PLAY THIS GAME! I give it a 1/5, because it’s probably one of the worst flash games ever.

4 A nice little world to explore
All in all, this is a good game—a nice atmosphere, a cool bestiary, lots of loot, a few interesting mechanics, and a good old-school feel. In short, it’s about what you expect.

As many have said, the combat system is a mixed bag, perhaps a bit weak. I don’t find that fights are long and tedious, but they are repetitive—most of your tactics will involve either side-stepping a circle around the monster you’re fighting or, if you’re in a narrow space, backing up a step, hitting the monster as it comes into the adjacent square, backing up again before it can hit you, and repeat until it’s dead. A few monsters add a little extra tactical consideration to the mix, such as the charging, side-swiping ogres, but not many. The fighting only gets really interesting when you have multiple enemies in an open space and have to maneuver and watch your back constantly—there are maybe half a dozen of those fights in the game.

The spell system is a similar story. The basic mechanics of selecting runes on the fly are really cool, but your library of spells is extremely limited, and worse, it doesn’t vary based on the school of magic you choose. Whether you’re a fire, ice, air, or earth mage, you will get one close-range weak attack, one elemental shield, one long-range powerful attack, and one arrow enchantment. And that’s literally it (except one extra spell, invisibility, which comes with air). It would be nice if there were different strategies for different mages, but alas.

The skill sets and four-party system do give you lots of different possible strategies, though, and most of the skills are well balanced against each other. Your rogue can be a backstabbing, critical hitting shredding machine who can reach with melee attacks from the back row, or a ranger-type character with bow mastery and an assortment of enchanted arrows to choose from.

Level design is a key strength, and the puzzles in particular are meticulously put together. Unfortunately, this often means that you face extremely frustrating races against time. On the other hand, it often means that you always have a perfectly placed alcove to duck into for cover, and that you will always be able to find exactly the item set you need for the upcoming fights if you look hard for it.

The thing that most makes this game shine is its attention to detail, and especially the thrill of finding each new treasure, most of which are unique, tucked away in a corner or hidden behind a secret door. There’s always some new puzzle, some surprising challenge, some cool little piece of a world to find around the next bend. That’s what made the Ultima games at the peak of the series some of the best games of all time, and it’s what makes Legend of Grimrock a game well worth playing.

4 Excellent twist on the endless runner, with an emphasis on speed and combos
In Solipskier, you indirectly control the titular hero by quickly swiping across the playfield to instantly create the slopes that he rides on. Emphasis is placed on building up speed multipliers and avoiding hazards, or dropping off the bottom of the screen.

The controls feel good with a mouse, but shine even more on iOS devices.

This game came out about a year after Canabalt, but still well before the indie game scene was saturated with endless running games, and it holds up as a very unique twist on the genre. There aren’t many other games like it and the feel of speeding your skier up through careful manipulation is quite satisfying.

Highly recommended.