It's a beautiful game with truly unique visual style well executed done with much attention to details and love. But while there are games that will do fine with just that feature most of the times games require well, gameplay and preferably a fun one. And while this game is beautiful for sure it's gameplay isn't so much. Much like the studio's previous game, Creature In The Well this particular game has an interesting idea at it's core that wasn't given much attention other than more or less it's existence. You play as a mechanical mecha-bug in a micro-world not unilke "Honey I've shrink our kids" exploring tall grass, tree branches and rocky shores while gathering resources needed to ungrage your mecha-bug and fighting bugs, slugs and other creatures living in that (micro-) world. The fighting itself is mostly takes form of arena battles where you are trapped in a hemisphere while deflecting waves of enemies. And fighting is, by far, is the weakest part of the game, It's not fun, it's tedious, it's unintuitive and repetitive. It's over-complicated and too easy at the same time as while you have dozens of abilities to use what you actually do is spamming one basic attack and occasionally heal yourself up until there would be no enemies left. Exploring on the other hand is mostly fun and meditating experience with just a right tempo and beautiful visuals and wonderful music to set the mood. The handcrafted nature of levels instead of proceduraly generated mazes from Creature In The Well helps alot too. All in all it's a fine game but it's not a fun one with a jarring story, boring and lackluster combat and occasional but irritating bugs here and there(sorry not sorry) that broke immersion.
I rarely do reviews but this game so much worth it. I've in love with the art style of the game and it's mood - it's rarely you got to play a game that much polished in terms of actual sensual experiences. I really dig the feel and the story which is the perk in itself since the game is tightly tied to the certain period and location in UK of which I wasn't even that aware or. It is polished in all the departments mind you. Since I'm playing on linux I've used to a treatment as a second-class citizen and rarely a game just launched worked flawlessly without a couple of patches. This game works just great without a hitch. The only minor problem I've encountered so far with this game is that I cannot play it with my ages-old wired gamepad since it wasn't supported be the middleware the game is using. But playing with the keyboard is working surprisingly well. Gameplay wise it's better to play with someone else I guess but it's totally enjoyable as a single player affair(which is my case) and it's gameplay is tied pretty nifty with the game's narrative and they compliment each other really well. So if you're in for some topdown story driven adventure of how is it to be a ten year kid -- that's the perfect game for ya. And even if you're not give it a try -- it's a great piece of art be itself and it's totally worth it.
