Decent little sokoban-esque puzzle game. While the trailer and screenshots might give some the impression that this is an open-world game, it is actually ENTIRELY linear. You must complete all puzzles one by one in a fixed order in order to progress. While linearity is often frowned upon in puzzle games, it didn’t really bother me in this game as the puzzles were on the easier side and there aren’t that many puzzles in total, so I never really felt like I was ‘stuck’.
The core mechanic is your character’s ability to cast magic ‘portals’ (that’s what they’re called in-game, but they don’t behave like typical portals you see in games) that allow you to walk on water, phase through blocks, or even store blocks and then manifest them later. I found this portal mechanic quite original and fun, but sadly there are no additional mechanics beyond that, besides the usual block-pushing. No new elements are introduced after the tutorial section, though you will discover one or two subtleties about the portal mechanic that aren’t explicitly mentioned in the tutorial after a few non-tutorial puzzles. As a result, the puzzles don’t stand out from each other and are far from memorable. Thankfully the novelty of the core mechanic is enough to carry the game, and because the game is fairly short and easy, you should be able to beat it before it gets stale. To get a taste of the portal mechanic, there is a very short free prototype of the game available to play on the web [https://shorturl.at/jDGI5]. Just search up “SokoBunny” by Zuza on Itch.io if the link is broken or removed.
Puzzles aside, you will also encounter several NPCs as you walk along the path, each offering a few short lines of dialogue. The dialogue is rather random and while mildly amusing, doesn’t really add much to the narrative, though there wasn’t much narrative to begin with as this is pretty much just a bunny paying a visit to their grandparents’ house, solving puzzles along the way. No explanation is given for the bunny’s mysterious magic powers.
All in all, I would say this game is worth playing due to its originality of puzzle mechanics. Even if the puzzles aren’t the most challenging, they are still highly enjoyable to solve, and the lower difficulty does make the game more accessible and relaxing. Having said that, it’s debatable whether the game is worth the full price of 8 USD due to how short it is. While its core mechanic is undeniably unique, there isn’t really that much depth to it for it to blow your mind, especially when there aren’t any further mechanics introduced. The graphics and soundtrack are nice, but nothing spectacular. The NPCs are a welcome addition, but nothing substantial. I personally think 5 USD would have been a fairer price, though games on Steam are so often on sale nowadays that I guess the base price doesn’t really matter much anymore.
