Limbo Review: Tread Carefully

Kicking off this year’s annual Summer of Arcade comes the award-winning puzzle-platformer, Limbo – an extraordinary little title from Danish developer, PlayDead Studios. Following the likes of Braid and Lucidity on XBLA, Limbo succeeds in all the right places – but does its distinct art style and clever puzzles make it worthy of a place on your digital shelf? Hit the jump and dive in as we give our verdict on a journey through hell’s edge.

Entering Limbo

In Limbo the player assumes the role of a nameless young boy who is uncertain of his sister’s fate and so enters Limbo setting forth on a journey of unproportional magnitude. Unfortunately, unless you’ve read the game’s description, the game does very little to remind you what the hell’s happening (no pun intended) and why you are where you are.

Despite the lack of narrative, Limbo impressively manages to build a strong connection with the player from the start, without sparing even as much as a word. For some strange reason the hope of finding something, anything even, will keep the player ploughing on until the very end.

Don't let Limbo's simple controls fool you - Major Nelson

Good Old Puzzles and Platforming

A simple control scheme (above) has you at one with the game from the minute you start, after all PlayDead aren’t about to lose you here. Instead the game’s puzzles offer up the real challenge and intend to keep, frustrate and kill – over and over again. Adopting a trial-and-error approach, the game requires patience and experimentation – and lots of it. You’ll fail countless of times only to pick yourself up again and give it one last go.

When you’re not solving the game’s mind-bending puzzles, you’ll likely be hurdling death pits and bear traps. The platforming elements require precise button presses at times; gaps can just about be jumped and boulders just about avoided – it all comes down to timing. Both elements of the game work in tandem and create a fantastic gameplay experience for the player – one not to be missed.

Damn those onlookers!

Watch Out

From the minute you wake you’re instantly thrown onto this roller coaster ride through Limbo. The game doesn’t let up and you always feel like dangers lurk right around the corner. Set pieces are woven into the game beautifully and you soon begin to learn it’s never a good sign when quiet turns to silence – which usually means you’re about to die.

The game can be completed in five to six hours depending on the gamer’s puzzle solving abilities, though I’ve heard it’s been beaten in less. Retailing for 1200 MS Points (£10/$15) it doesn’t exactly scream value for money, there’s not much replayability unless you’re an achievement whore and even then the online leaderboard lacks key stats rendering the game useless after completion – fortunately this is the game’s only drawback.

Not for Kids

In case you haven’t noticed, Limbo is stunning! It’s dreary grey visuals and stark black silhouettes tear through the screen and encapsulate you within its hauntingly beautiful world almost immediately – though that’s not to say it’s all pretty.

The game doesn’t shy from being gruesome and after your first bear trap you’ll soon realise how messy it all gets thanks to Limbo’s brilliant physics limb-chopping engine. Bodies decorate the forest halls while whirring buzz saws keep you back, ready to decapitate in a heartbeat. Disturbing but yet so peaceful, Limbo triumphantly succeeds at creating a sick beauty.

The game also does a great job of placing you in between objects and elements that make up the world, layered objects stand above and below the two-dimensional plane making the player feel truly trapped, and escape that much more necessary.

Subtle grainy flickers fill the screen and monochrome styled visuals lend to the game’s dark atmospheric mood, an air of eeriness sets the stage and ambient noise in place of a soundtrack help craft Limbo into what it is – a truly breathtaking assault on the senses, an assault you’d be hard pressed to find elsewhere.

Worth the Experience?

Limbo’s one of those rare gems that comes along to shake up gaming once in a while, a glimpse into a truly untouched world and a reminder that video games are just as much as an art form as any other medium. It tells a tale without words, and that speaks volumes in itself.