The Architect Review

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This game focuses on the need to get to the end square while traversing the stage. Platforms can be raised and lowered to reach different levels of the stage, aiding the player in the end goal. A level cannot be finished until the necessary quantity of space modifiers has been reached to be able to complete a stage. The use of the PC gives some freedom in control with the mouse and keyboard

The objectives were made clear, collection all the space modifiers would give you the power to raise or drop cubes so that you can traverse the stage to reach the end goal. The end goal being a cube that sat the red outline of another. It was not clear to see at all times on the stage but once close, you knew what you were aiming to get to. Requirements were needed to end the level, collecting a quantity of each space modifier. One colour would be spent to raise the cube and one would be spent to lower.

The controls were a bit strange for me, I didn’t quite understand why they were set out as they were. The normal movement keys were used, these being the arrow keys and wasd which would move you left, right, up and down. The keys I found uncomfortable were Q and E which would move the camera, as the mouse was needed to click cubes for raising and dropping, there wasn’t a great choice of getting to pick arrow keys for one hand and camera keys for another. I found myself getting frustrated at how I could not seem to get the camera angle right for moving around as nearly each time I moved, I was needing to adjust the camera. I would have preferred a top down view of the whole stage rather than having to chase myself around.

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Raising and dropping cubes was necessary to get around the level and collect all the modifiers. It was slightly unclear to see which heights the cubes were sitting, sometimes making it easy to was modifiers which could be aggravating. The level designs themselves were good, but with it being unclear with an unreliable camera, the well thought out stages did seem to fade into the background.

The graphics are simple, the use of spheres and cubes being the main aspect. This has its advantages as it can contribute to easily creating new and interesting levels through a game, although with the design of the cubes, it isn’t always clear to see how highly raised one is. You find yourself playing around with the camera before you start using valuable resources which I felt became more of a hindrance rather than an obstacle. It would have been good to see that collectables differ rather than just blue and green orbs with a slight light radiation.

With these things in mind the game does successfully grant a sci-fi aspect which does give a better feel to the fact that anything could be possible. This also leading to some interesting levels being created throughout the stages of the game. With the frustration of clarity however, I did feel this novelty wear thin quite quickly. I would have liked to see some sort of personalisation for the player too, considering the character is a sphere, it would have been easy to grant different light effects and colours of someone to toy around with and make it feel a little bit different each time they load up the game.

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The sound to this game is quite pleasant. The music used in the screens between levels and during a level is high quality with a rhythmic pattern which contributes well to the flow of the game. I found that it helped me to keep a level head while playing through stages and reduced my frustration of the camera angles when trying to find my way around. The sound effects seem repetitive but this is only because there are very few needs for them, as there are not many different obstacles.

I would say that there is a replayability aspect within the game but for myself, I cannot see me returning any time soon as I became bored and uninterested pretty quick. I felt my attention trailing off elsewhere quite often and had nothing gripping me back to the game. Leading me to want to wander into something else. There was the difficulty of the levels that could make a real puzzle enthusiast come running back to challenge the route they have taken in a different way but as my interest faded I found this being something that would not play with my own curiosity.

If you are a puzzle enthusiast, this game will is perfect, the challenges will keep you entertained and coming back. Personally this game just was not for me, the art style was a nice idea but made the game look a little bit unclear and simple. The camera angles were not great, it was difficult to see the stage from some positions and I would have preferred a bird’s eye view throughout, with the colours of the cubes being different to indicate how high or low they were positioned. The game does offer a different puzzle experience but not one that I will be rushing back to.

rating-4

REVIEW CODE: A complimentary PC code was provided to Brash Games for this review. Please send all review code enquiries to editor@brashgames.co.uk.

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