I play games to unwind or transport myself away from this burned out existence called everyday life. Seeing that life tends to win, I play a lot less than I used to. This leads to missing extremely good games, in this case it was an indie title called Limbo.
The recent Steam Summer Sale has been so wholesomely good to me. Showering the unwashed masses with game deal after game deal, allowing us to stock up on some titles I did not grab at their release. When I saw Limbo just hanging there on the Steam feature page, I quickly ran to my Paypal account praying to find the meager $2.49 I needed to own this award winning indie game from Playdead. Yes, thank god I had about 3 bucks in the account and the game was mine.
Limbo is a 2D side scrolling puzzler that trades a colorful vibrant world for the monochromatic black and white backdrop seen in these pictures. By now the game has been released on both consoles and computers. Playdead explained the game as being a style of “trail and death” meaning players are expected to die trying to figure the game’s puzzles out. I will forgo the “games as art” speech here because this title is truly a work of art and most know it.
The game revolves around a nameless boy who seeks his missing sister. Players take on the role of this young man and complete various environmental puzzles through the somewhat short single player campaign. There are no additional modes outside of single player and the options to tweak visuals on the PC are limited to adjusting the brightness.
The controls are of standard 2D platform type allowing the character to go left, right, jump and climb some obstacles. I prefer to play platforming games with a controller so I opted to use my Xbox 360 PC controller. The controls are pretty tight and forgiving when they need to be. Although movement is simple the puzzles do require some fast response from the player.
The game transitions from environmental type puzzles to mechanical ones utilizing machinery, gadgets and gravity. The game play does not stray from the tried and true plan of enter an area, complete puzzle and move onto next area/puzzle. The puzzles are unique enough to be challenging. Players will have plenty of “oh duh, I knew that” moments while playing through Limbo.
I absolutely love the look of this game. The gray scale graphics give everything a perfect amount of spook and depth. The lighting is so perfectly layered that almost any scene in this game can be paused and taken in as art. On more than one occasion I found myself pausing to snag a screen clip to show friends. The story does seem to be a little more adult oriented as you will kill other humans in the game and cone across dead bodies.
If the graphical presentation was not enough the game’s sound should “seal the deal” for almost anyone. The sound effects are very minimal but effective. Different audio cues can be used to help you through a level. If you remember to listen you will benefit from the sound effects in the game. Case in point, there was an area where I needed a spider to pound the ground so a trap would fall from a tree. If I listened each time the spider stuck the ground a metal clank could be heard. When I finally heard the last clank the trap had fallen.
My only major complaint here is length. The game does not have a lot of reply value once you have completed it. The lack of any other modes or game options kind of bummed me out. I loved the game, but I just wish there was more if it. The only other complaint from a PC gamer’s eyes would be the ability to tweak visual settings. With no option outside of a brightness adjustment there is really nothing to distinguish this from the console version.
Pros
+Awesome visuals and sound effects
+Great value at $10 or less
+Very atmospheric and spooky
Cons
-Can be finished in less than 2 hours
-Could use some PC tweaking options
Run don’t walk to get this title. It plays the same across all platforms so regardless of what you have it will be a blast. The game is currently available on Xbox Live, PSN and Steam for at or around $10. If you keep an eye out the game does drop down to $5 or less when a sale hits. Here is to hoping more indie developers take notice of what gamers want and continue to wow us.
