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Game Review: Limbo

Limbo

(Xbox Live Arcade)

The gameplay is as basic as can be: Run, jump, climb, push, pull.

The audio is sparse: Most of the time you are accompanied only by the sound of your own footsteps.

The visuals are stark: The game is in black and white and takes you from one bleak, hazy vista to the next.

These simple elements combine to create a truly excellent game.

I was intrigued from the moment I started playing. You wake up in a dark forest. Your character is a small boy, non-descript except for his glowing eyes. Right away the combination of audio and visuals create an eldritch atmosphere. Nothing has happened yet, but you know there is danger lurking nearby. It doesn't take long to experience just how dangerous this limbo is. I died twice within the first minute of gameplay. This is very much a game of trial and error. You will die a lot. The death mechanic is forgiving. You respawn very close to the place you died, removing the frustration of having to replay sections of the game. Deaths are also quite brutal. You'll be dismembered, impaled, electrified. The first time I stepped in a bear trap I was a little shocked to see my head separated from my body. Deaths involve little visual detail and no gore but they still elicit a very visceral reaction. I couldn't help but wince every time the character fell onto a spike or suffered a bone-crunching fall. It provided a very good incentive to try not to die again (though I usually did).

The puzzles are enjoyable and varied. They start out simple and then build up, adding new elements on to the ones you have already used to create more difficultly. The puzzles mainly focused on a combination of object manipulation and timing and I found them to be well balanced. Many required creative thinking but none were challenging enough to cause you to stop and think for too long and disrupt the flow of the game.

The audio is a real stand-out. It mostly consists of ambient noise; your footsteps, gusts of wind, the trickling of water. The stillness of the game is haunting. This creates much more impact when music or more intense sounds are used. I found myself startled more than once when the silence was broken by the snap of a steel trap shutting or the whirr of a buzz saw. The audio also does an excellent job of guiding you forward. Off-screen noises signal when something in the environment has changed and the onset of dramatic music lets you know when you're in danger and must act quickly. The audio is perfectly in sync to what's happening onscreen.

Narrative is almost completely absent from the game. There is no dialogue, there is no back-story given beyond the tagline. Though a good story is usually one of the first things I look for in a game, the absence of it didn't bother me at all. The atmosphere provided enough of a hook to keep me playing until the end.

The game is quite brief, lasting only 3-4 hours. While I find the price (1200 points) a little hefty, the length is ideal. If it was too much longer the unique elements would become familiar and it would lose much of its appeal.

Limbo is a unique, haunting and engrossing diversion. I thoroughly recommend it.

Rating:

Limbo is available on Xbox Live Arcade.