Machinarium : Collectors Edition (PC/Mac DVD)
Collectors Edition includes:
- Additional CD with the games music and 5 additional bonus sound tracks
- Â Booklet including never seen before concept art
- A3 Poster
- A printed walkthrough
Machinarium is a puzzle video game developed by Amanita Design. The goal of Machinarium is to solve a series of puzzles and brain teasers. The puzzles are linked together by an overworld consisting of a traditional and click†adventure story.
The overworld most radical departure is that only objects within the player character reach can be clicked on. Machinarium is notable in that it contains no dialogue, neither spoken nor written. The game instead uses a system of animated thought bubbles.
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A Work of Art,
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This adventure game is a beautiful thing, with stunning hand-drawn backgrounds, brilliantly detailed characters, and a fantastic soundtrack (included with the special edition on a bonus CD). It is astonishing how funny and moving a game with no dialogue can be. The puzzles are challenging but there is a great hint-system for when you are stuck, as well as a mini arcade-style game which, when completed, will give you the walkthrough for the relevant section. The walkthrough is also included in the package as a booklet, but really the fun is, as in every classic adventure game, all about trying to figure out the crazy logic of the game’s world. The puzzles can be incredibly complex but this just adds to the satisfaction of finally cracking them. This deluxe edition also comes with a booklet of concept art which gives an insight into the development of the game’s amazing animation. The music, graphics, storyline and puzzles compliment each other sublimely, but for me, the real beauty of the game is in the main character’s personality, which is impossibly endearing considering he is mute: every shake of the head or tap of the foot conveys a huge amount of character. There is real soul and emotional resonance imbued in this game – ironically, considering all the characters are mute robots. My only criticism of this near-perfect game is that it is over too soon!
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|ERUDIO CONIECTURALEM ARTEM ESSE MACHINARIUMNAM,
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To paraphrase Cornelius Celsus, Machinarium is the Art of Educated Guessing. Yes, art.
This indie gem is a definite affirmation to the question whether PC gaming is an art-form. In recent years the genre has strayed towards the-latest-hardware-demanding yet vapid eye-candy. So when a slow and moody game comes along, on that can run in almost any machine and offers subtle fan, we tend to underestimate it.
This is a logic puzzle-adventure. Sometimes the puzzles are easy. Sometimes you get lucky. And sometime you get stuck and you shall need hints or even the level walkthrough contained in a locked book that opens with a mini-game. However, perseverance is rewarded with the satisfaction of being able to untangle the inner logic of the game.
I have been playing puzzle adventures ever since MYST and, although I am not an exclusive fan of the genre, over the years I have played its best representatives. And MACHINARIUM should be considered one of them.
The game is also a avant-garde cartoon story, with beautifully hand-drawn backgrounds and an endearing protagonist.
The game may not last long but I promise you it will stay for you for a very long time.
HIGHLY RECOMMENDED!
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|Almost perfect,
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– Graphics: Superb hand drawn graphics with the kind of loving attention to detail which have made the games of Amanita Design famous. Quite an astonishingly gorgeous use of flash that you wouldn’t notice (except if you right click you only get the context menu!).
- Characterisation: Simply crafted and instantly recognisable character types. The charm oozes out of them despite lack of dialogue, even the “bad guys” have something endearing about them!
- User Interface: Clear and minimal with very little fussiness – however having to go to the edge of the screen to make the inventory appear every time you need to collect an item gets rather frustrating. I’m sure you’ll discover why. The hints system can help, and it’s probably a good thing that there aren’t any clues as to how to go about opening the walk-through book which is generously available for times when it all gets too much
- Gameplay: Before I say any more, I must point out that it is clear a whole load of love and dedication has gone into making the game work just so and all decisions on how to make it play must have been thoroughly considered. It is such a joy to figure the puzzles out and when you make things work it can give a real buzz.
(Disclaimer: apologies for all the detail following, this is a minor point and should not spoil your overall enjoyment)
It is just unfortunate that some of the finer points have been over complicated. Being used to point and click games, one would expect once you see a relevant item to collect or interact with, a simple click or verb selection would do the trick followed by a quick follow up to take/move/talk to it/them. Call me lazy, but not being able to tell whether you can interact with something until you’re right next to it does make parts of the game unnecessarily tedious. Don’t get me wrong, as a whole, the steady pace of walking around doesn’t bug me, I’m not as impatient as I once was, zooming around “Myst Revelation” with the lightning bolt tool (which missed out vital clues sometimes too), I just don’t think we should have to toddle across the screen to look at an object just for our friendly bot to shake his head disappointedly. Also, I like the nice touch of being able to grow and shrink to reach, but when we’re moving across the screen it would be nice to automatically reset to the right height to walk as efficiently as possible when there’s no call for the change in height. I can think of at least a few puzzles where speed was needed and adjusting the character’s height was far too fiddly.
Music: To end on a high note (boom, boom) Tomás Dvo’ák’s (aka Floex, also look up his album on here) score is an absolute delight and just as good to listen to for its own merits, therefore this pack is quite a wonderful collectors item and I wish it had been available outside of Germany when I first bought it online!
Conclusion: A game you will treasure (unfortunately not with a playing duration as long as I would have hoped) and want to go back to plenty of times, a good thing that it is now available physically to take full advantage of its beautiful design.
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