To that end, close friends and coworkers β most of whom are pretty serious gamers β have shared excitement about new releases, recommended games, and listened to me complain about Warren from Life is Strange.
Recently a coworker sent me a video review for a new game called Inside that looks amazing. Limbo is really, really great. They call the main character a boy, but I say fuck that because you only ever see their silhouette and they could just have an adorable queer haircut and who knows even?
Anyway, the game begins somewhat abruptly and without any introduction. It fades from black as you wake up on the forest floor, blinking to adjust to your new surroundings. Everything is black and white, and the setting is full of beautiful, artistic depth, with layers of trees and branches and grass in soft focus.
The soundtrack is moody and atmospheric, relying mostly on sound effects and purposeful silence, and it does well to set an eerie tone. At its most basic level, Limbo is a 2-D puzzle-based platformer. Each obstacle, and sometimes stages that are part of a larger puzzle, triggers a respawn. This is really key, because I died. A lot. Limbo is violent as hell. If I accidentally grazed the edge of one, I still gasped audibly when it snapped on me. In general, puzzle-based games tend to not be my favorite types.
I usually crave a good story. I played fanatically for a few days, but eventually lost interest and deleted the app from my phone. Limbo is different for a few reasons. Even after I realized what my character had to do whether it was me actually figuring it out or, a few times, watching a clip on YouTube , I still had to actually do the thing. It can be frustrating at times, but it never made me want to stop playing the game. When you swing back and forth on a rope, the momentum carries you exactly the way you would expect it to in real life.
