Limbo – Review [XBLA]

Is the land and world known as Limbo worth picking up? or is it better to leave the boy in his world with its darkness and gloomy environments… Find out in this review.

Limbo is one of those games that you wouldn’t expect to be a beautiful game. By looking at it you can already assume its just one of those “black and white games”. Well your correct there but its no just “one of those” it its thee most beautiful black and white game out there.  The jet-black ink design and charcoal textures really make the game glow. The world as we know it for Limbo is grainy, dark with gloom written all over it. The game really has a huge depth of field with the design and really makes you feel your involved in the world our campaign is facing. Expect to die a lot, death is around ever corner. The only sweetness you will receive is those beautiful glowing butterflies’ that make you think of a simpler time. There is hope and hope is all we need.

Limbo has gone for a very artistic vision, that could strike ones eye as just a horribly dull designed game with no artsy vision at all… That’s not the case, surprisingly. As it is pulchritudinous in all its glory. Limbo is a 2D puzzle-platformer fixed around black as its main colour. You control a boy who you can faintly see the outline off. Since his eyes light the screen up like 2 light bulbs you get slight imagery of the outline in the darkness. Spiky hair and shorts seems to be his style. If you gave the young lad some colour, and we would appear to have Gareth Ventins brother (in the picture on the right).

All we know about the boy’s task is to find his sister. That is the only ‘story’ and I use the term ‘story’ loosely. There’s nothing more to it. Don’t expect any cut scenes to explain any back story. Is it an issue? Nope, not one bit. Its all about beating those puzzles and the games environments and get to the goal.

Playdead (the developer) have really paid close attention to not just the art style of the game but also how the game and character react with the different parts of the games environments. It may be odd to pickup on something possibly so small to the average gamer but Playdead have really outdone themselves on the shadow cast effects. It works brilliant and how it can change the way you see the game as it can misguiding you, keeping you on edge.

You may think the darkness alone sets the unsettling image for Limbo but there’s more than meets the eye; tree branches that move, flinch and twitch before attaching you with a brutal blow that will break the silence between you and the game. The objects that control different parts of the game such as buttons to make an object do something, wont behave how you would like and everything is built around you to get you.

It is torture that you the player will come by, and like I stated previously. Be prepared to die. You will die an unlimited amount of painless deaths and since your character doesn’t really have protection or strength. He is very weak and defenceless in this manic world he has entered.  The main aspect of the game is to solve puzzles to progress further in the game. It may be working out how to get to a far away rope; getting across water;zip lines its all there for you to over come with your mind. There are many different ways to die, expect buzz saws to end up cutting you to shreds, being squashed by spikes or just falling from a very high height. Its probably creepy of me to say but its actually quiet funny how much fatality a games environment can bring.

Even though dieing allot will happen and I assure you curious about how can you keep your progression. Well they’re are many different checkpoints throughout the game giving some light on its dark outlook.

The main fault that you will experience when playing Limbo is Trial-and-error.  You will encounter multiple tasks that will cause you to die numerous times. Even though some tasks may seem impossible, and will take a while to master. Frustration isn’t really something accrues. Even though the game will bring you pain on your trial-and-errors its all comes down to be a delightful experience. Odd I know but Playdead have worked a way to make a game that would feel so frustrating into a fun exciting puzzle.

The game is short and will take up to four hours to complete depending on how good you are at manoeuvring the boy through all the platforming environments. You will need skill to master the boy through to the end of game and face lots of ; jumping, moving crates, swinging from platforms and so fourth.  The puzzling aspect stands as the main core of the game.

Limbo has a very impressive atmosphere upon it. The first opening part of the game straight away places you in to an insanity of an unsettling nature. It makes you feel alone and lost, as upon scared to face an encounter with death as your always on edge and looking around to try and overcome this. The puzzle in the first section of the game is not to hard, which is good for opening up the game with. This said it does become much more of a challenge as the boy progresses through more areas of the game.

Its hard to complain about Limbo since it is a perfect puzzler. But this stated some of the puzzles are far to complex and are very fiddly to overcome. These sort of puzzles no longer require your brain power and this is where the slight frustration will step in. This is the only major complain we have but its nothing to series to make you stop playing.

Overall 9/10
Limbo is a beautiful game with an oxymoron of cheerful humour. It is a game that will always keep you on edge. The puzzle elements are brilliant and really shifts the tone of the game as the game progresses.  Limbo will make you feel lost, and when you become lost you become apart of the game making you want to clear the darkness and reach the light. The realisation of making the player feel involved with the character in Limbo really stands strong and its a character that will haunt players memories for sometime. But in a positive way if that is possible. Limbo once completed will make you continuously play again, and again. For 1200 Microsoft Points it is worth picking up!