Block in the Lock

Decent free puzzle game, not difficult, pretty fun to play.

nice

This is possibly the most convoluted Sokoban ripoff I've seen in a while. "Block in the Lock" is a mimimalist grid based block placement/pathing puzzle game from Itchio, with a nearly unique gameplay goal. What do you do in the game? Like Sokoban, you're moving blocks around to reach a target area. Unlike Sokoban, you're moving a whole bunch of blocks all at the same time, and bumping into objects will make the group of blocks change their positions relative to each other... and that's the goal. You have to bump the blocks until they meet the target shape (kind of like a key and lock, if that makes the title make more sense), then finally move your finished shape to the matching target. Whew. Well, none of that adds up to what anyone would consider a cutting edge, professionally developed PC gaming experience. Here's another case where Itch failed. They have like, ONE job... to act as containment to prevent poorly made amateur shovelware from leaking out onto platforms where gamers might see them and lose hope in the gaming industry. But here we are. The participation trophies and hi-5's from the group hug weren't enough and some of the amateur drivel they're supposed to protect us from got out. So this looks like an old 1990's Adobe Flash game that you might play in a web browser, and the problem there is obviously Steam wasn't intended to try compete with Chrome and Firefox. If it can be done in a web browser, it's not even close to a cutting edge PC gaming experience. That's a problem. This game features very lacklustre minimalist "art" for graphics instead of anything remotely contemporary. I'm sure the "developer" thought this would come across as "artistic", but it doesn't, it comes across as "really lazy". Yes, contemporary 3D graphics take a lot of time and effort to create. That doesn't mean it's okay not to bother! Developers must try to understand that gaming is a visual medium, and gamers spend a lot of money on high end gaming rigs for a reason. And that reason is not so they can look at lazy, phoned-in half efforts like this. You're forced to sign a highly questionable yet legally unenforceable End User License Agreement... for such a relatively low effort, low quality product, this comes across more as a delusion of grandeur than anything else. This agreement includes questionable requirements that may attempt to revoke consumer law protections that gamers expect to have, which is also highly problematic. Developers must learn they are here to serve gamers, not control them. I had my cat walk over the keyboard while the EULA was displaying, which fixed that problem for me. This game is fairly dated at 7 years old... and even back then it looked old and busted compared to contemporary, professionally made 3D games of the same period. It looked bad then, it looks worse now. Now on to pricing and value for gamers. There's no initial download price, but the developer was charging $7 USD for this. Price barriers, especially on low quality products, can be a direct cause of failure. It seems like a nice gesture for the game to have no up-front cost anymore, but it also tells us that the game wasn't good enough to succeed as a paid product. This is also a bit of a slap in the face to anyone who showed enough questionable judgement to pay money for this... nobody got refunded. Even as a free product, this couldn't find an audience. With a peak of [b]only 7 users[/b], it's clear the Steam community took one look and walked away. They literally couldn't pay people to spend time with this. Bearing in mind that free games don't add +1 to your game collector count, should you bother adding this to your library and downloading it? What's the verdict? I think you should give this one a miss. Although it's free, your time and storage are valuable resources, and the market is filled with superior options.

brain hurty but in a good way

It's a really simple premise, you control multiple block and get yourself into the place in the right shape, plus the usual additional ten or so gimmicks seen in other sokobans. Looking for a new take? not here, just want some puzzles? Well this game will please you with worlds focusing on gimmicks, a final world of all mechanic and the challenge puzzles that comes in sets with similarly themed but increasingly hard puzzle per level. Puzzles aren't exactly hard, its more exhausting since there's way more puzzles with emphasis on managing to do it instead of finding an idea, its not as if its brainless or bland, instead the ideas would usually show itself immediately from the name, theme, and or level design. Not that its bad, just not my personal cup of tea, but despite that it still gave me an enjoyable experience. Mechanics aren't tied to their home world but instead used as a support for an idea of the current world's mechanic, their tutorial levels introduced it well, it likes to get complicated slow until the endgame. Onto the minor stuff, Level selection feels slow, the slow fade in with the level name drop followed by slow color change before finally fading out to the puzzle does not look good nor feel good, it also makes me focus more on one level even if I'm stumped since theres no way I'm playing those transitions more than I need to. The Undos are also painfully slow, your instinct to spam Z does not let you undo fast enough, I'm not sure if its cap or I'm bad, but I don't like holding Z too as its slow to speed up. Art style is the kind of simplistic design that I like, mechanics are easily distinguishable between each other visually. The music is alright, it feels like a template brainteaser music. Overall not much to nitpick. Its an alright game, if you're looking for a playable game then play it.

一个免费游戏质量比收费游戏都高 附加关卡都难哭了

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