OXCGN – Breathing Life Into Gaming

OXCGN’s LIMBO XBLA Review – Braid’s Darker Twin

by Shadow Wave

© 2010 Ben Cadwallader

Quite simply, Limbo will most likely be one of the most talked about Arcade games of the year.

It’s one of those games that tries to do something quite similar to other games of its genre but puts its own twist on it.  And the twist is great.

Limbo is a side scrolling platformer made by PlayDead Studios, with its primary focus on solving physics based puzzles to progress through the eerie world of Limbo.

And the eerie world is exactly what makes this game intriguing. You play as a  young boy who wakes up in the woods and travels through many environments in search of his lost sister.

The environments look amazing, and although this is a 2D side scroller, the game has a foreground and background plane that helps give a 3D sense to the game world and makes these backgrounds come alive.  As the boy walks through the woods you will see trees far off in the distance and close up branches brush past the camera.  And every now and then, maybe something creepier will be seen.

The game is in black and white the entire time, there is never a coloured moment, which was a risky move that has payed off well as it really gives off that classic horror look. Adding to this is the fact that music is pretty much nonexistent. Generally you’ll be mainly listening to environmental noise, foot steps and the occasional short tune that indicates you’ve been successful.

This is no Mario clone; Limbo focuses just on its puzzles, however, that doesn’t mean you can’t die. You will find that the majority of Limbo’s puzzles in some way or another can and will kill you.

Death is something that the player will become quite used to as you progress, often you won’t even know you’re walking through a puzzle until a giant boulder or something just as deadly drops you right where you’re standing.

Thankfully Limbo has a very generous checkpoint system, so usually when you die you will reappear almost exactly where you were before you died within quite a short load time.

Although for some of the more complicated puzzles you might find yourself back at the beginning of the whole puzzle sequence and you’ll be forced to repeat the same tasks over and over (e.g. pushing blocks around) until you figure it out.  And this can become quite frustrating and mundane when you truly get stuck.

Some of puzzles have more depth to them than meets the eye. If you find an additional lever, rope or something that went unused there is a good chance there is a white glowing egg collectible for you to find for a glorious award of achievement points.  Sometimes these unused parts are hidden behind objects or obscured partially from your view.

Generally the puzzles to acquire these glowing eggs are a lot more difficult than the puzzles that simply progress you through the game. I certainly had trouble with some of them.  So for those challenge seekers out there, keep your eyes out.

Limbo might look a bit like a kids game at first glance, but this is aimed at the more mature aged people. The young boy’s deaths are quite graphic for the art style, as you’ll see him have his limbs torn off, get stabbed, squashed, cut in pieces and many other grisly ends.  As well as this the puzzles are quite complicated, so this is definitely suited towards teens and older.

The story in Limbo is pretty nonexistent. Although I’m sure its ending will raise a little discussion, overall it’s fairly anticlimactic. The game just suddenly ends unexpectedly and it did leave a little bit of a bad taste in my mouth. It’s also a bit on the short side at around 3 – 5 hours depending on brain power.

That being said, the game’s opening never really explained anything either, you just wake up in the forest and off you go. But it would have been nice for a cool little narrative to make an appearance throughout the game.  It’s clear the story was never the main intention of the game, but it’s easy to imagine how well a strong narrative could have been integrated into the Limbo world.

Obviously comparisons are going to be made with the other unique side scroller of this generation, Braid.  In my opinion Braid still takes the top spot in this genre, as it had the deep story, lack of death load times, beautiful accompanying music which kept the player in the zone.

Braid’s reverse time was not only a great puzzle idea but it made dying and trial and error something that was painless and easy. Limbo still has respawns and a lack of narrative doesn’t keep the player engaged as much as it could have.

Simply put, this game is quite the opposite of Braid.  But if you loved Braid your going to love this.

That being said, Braid is old news, and Limbo is new and is going to thrive as it’s arguably the best new Arcade game to be released this year.  It’s going to be one of those rare games that everyone will say you must play at least once.

So give it a go, I’m sure most people will appreciate how unique this game is and how well it brings you into its universe.

Definitely check this one out. Arcade game of the year? Well it’s definitely a strong contender.

“9/10

© 2010 Ben Cadwallader

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