The parallels to the games of Amanita Design are obvious - the "story" is similar to Samorost (kidnapped dog) and the game was, like Machinarium, published with the help of Adobe Air. However, in comparison with Machinarium, the latter does many things better. The puzzles are either primitive (most of them), illogical or user unfriendly. The user unfriendliness also applies to the user interface. Items can not be combined with each other. There are no save games; one can only continue a current game. A progress in the current screen will be lost then; it has to be done again. The translations are incomplete, as they are mainly done for the menus only. As for the humor, it falls flat, at least for me. I also dislike to have to search for tiny objects on the screen; this is a point that has been criticized so often in the past. It has been stated before that the game might appeal more to children, though they might also be angered by the issues mentioned. On a side note, there is a bug that if you restart the game, one item will be missing, it is however possible to continue without it. I like the graphics of the game (though they are less detailed than Machinarium). I found the sound and music also to be quite OK, even though the latter is repetitive. The credits are also nicely done. The short duration didn't bother me as much as the other points. It was certainly nice to see the game's style in action once, but as for the puzzles the game clearly falls behind many other adventures. Since the developers are currently working on a successor, I hope they are aware of the rather mixed reception and create something that can hold up to expectations. 2 1/2 stars from me.
While some players have issues with the graphical style and music, I got used to it quickly. I agree though that there are sometimes issues with the interface and that you need to scroll a lot to see certain infos. I certainly agree that there are problems with the logic. Terrorists appear with a whole army everywhere in the world and are even announced beforehand (hello, next year we'll appear in Cape Town from out of nowhere with infantry, tanks and planes). On the other hand, nuclear strikes don't seem to bother the attacked nation very much. Some events are clearly scripted, as they always appear and always at the same time. There is a certain lack of usefulness of blocks for alliances, as they are rather suitable for expansion. It is still sometimes unclear to me what my choices actually cause; I can enhance the industry and other things of a single territory, but how that adds to my score is sometimes intransparant to me. Still, I like playing around with the game, trying different countries and ways to play. I also like the humorous texts (on a side note for native German speakers: the translation is rather good, even though it contains a couple of small errors. It was clearly done by an Austrian who probably doesn't know that many Germans are unfamiliar with the word "lukrieren"). The game is certainly not aimed at the Paradox community, but some of the ideas I found interesting, even if they are somtimes flawed. For those who are more focused on details and who do not wish to hop from country to country or scenario to scenario this game can indeed become dull after a while
