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[h1]Overall Rating - Painfully Bad ★☆☆☆☆[/h1]
[h1]First Impressions[/h1]
I've had this game in my library for a few years, but haven't any idea where I got interLOGIC (IL) from. However, a simple puzzle game is something I like mucking around in, especially when I'm trying to kill a few minutes here and there. Sliding block puzzles, or sokoban as they're known, tend to get overly complicated for me, but IL winds up being far too simple, offering minimal challenge except for a handful of stages near the end.
[h1]Gameplay[/h1]
This sokoban game can have as many as five different colors of blocks on any given puzzle. Based on the number of each color, you'll either have to match them in sets of two or three in order to clear all of them. If there's five green blocks, and you pair two couples of them with each other, you have a spare green block leftover and fail. Many other games of this nature would include new mechanics or some form of limitation in order to increase the difficulty over time. For instance, arrows on the floor that force you to move blocks a certain direction, slippery floors that slide the block several spaces with one move, portals, etc.
However, the only variables in IL are how many blocks of each color are included, and the floor layout. Often, the puzzle consists of figuring out the correct order to clear the blocks. Once you figure out which blocks need to be cleared first, you're not very far from solving the puzzle. Because there's no hindrance on how many moves you take or interactions you can have with the blocks, you don't even have to plan out the most efficient route possible. As long as it works, that's sufficient. This factor really confuses me as to why there's a point system in the game. IL just isn't the kind of game that correlates with high scores and is a bit perplexing.
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2921611009
[h1]Controls[/h1]
The controls work alright, but the robot's movement feels slow and stiff. Out of control slipperiness would have been far worse, yet I do think the tin man could have benefited from some oil.
[h1]Story[/h1]
There's no explanation for what's going on, you're just a robot shoving blocks around to destroy them. Some say it's just a hobby and not his actual programmed purpose.
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2921610441
[h1]Visuals[/h1]
Placing dots on the floor sort of gives it a carpeted look, but with the isometric view, it also has the benefit of helping to line up the blocks on the floor. It's not very enjoyable if you can't readily tell where distinct rows and columns are. A similar issue comes up from the block colors, as for the most part they're stark enough to make them easily distinct. However, the purple-ish color can slightly blend in with the blue. I generally didn't mix them up, but at times when surveying the stage, I would confuse them for one another. If you suffer from color-blindness, there's no option to change these colors, so you'd just be out of luck. Regarding how the game looks, I don't think there's anything wrong with it per se, but it's also rather bland. The robot sort of looks like an over0engineered forklift.
[h1]Sound Design[/h1]
With the game's options at default, the background music is drowned out by the sound of the robot moving around and clearing blocks. Because you'll be concentrating on the puzzles anyways, you'll wind up unaware that you never noticed any songs at all. Having muted the sound effects and listened to the music for a while, I believe there might be a few songs that play in a cycle. They have a synthetic nature to them, which suits the neutral, robotic atmosphere decently. Some of it's a bit high-pitched or droning for my taste, but if the sound were better balanced, it could have played a stronger part in the game's design.
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2921610690
[h1]Pros[/h1]
🌟 The undo feature isn't a bad idea, but since you can only use it five times, the only real utility for it is if you bungle a move. If you make an error trying to solve the puzzle, by the time you realize it, you've probably made more than five moves already.
🌟 Some of the later stages start feeling like legitimate puzzles that make you think out your moves.
[h1]Cons[/h1]
❌ Menu navigation is far less clear than it should be. I've noticed the cursor doesn't always appear when it's supposed to when trying to navigate the stage selection screen. Plus, even though you'll play IL with a keyboard or controller, you need to use your mouse in order to click on the exit button to quit out of the game.
❌ My playtime comes from idling this game for cards, but it's something you can finish in about an hour.
❌ There's no diverse mechanics to change the gameplay up.
[h1]Tips[/h1]
🔍 The main part of every level you really need to figure out is which order the blocks have to be cleared in. Sometimes though, your options are painfully obvious, to the point it's almost a little insulting.
🔍 If you make a mistake, retrying the level might be your only choice, with how limited the undo feature is.
[h1]Final Thoughts[/h1]
Even if I thought IL was a decent game for how short it is, there's no panache or aspects that make it stand out amongst a very popular type of puzzle game. Sokobans are common, and except for being really easy and short, nothing about it stands out. I don't necessarily enjoy a puzzle game I'm not smart enough to solve, but in those situations, I can theoretically appreciate how devious and clever the designs are. In this game, I'm stumped by the inclusion of a needless point system, and am slightly miffed they didn't make level selection and menu navigation smoother. Unless you want easy achievements and some Steam cards, I'd avoid IL.
[table]
[tr]
[th]PC Specs[/th]
[th]Performance[/th]
[/tr]
[tr]
[td]Ryzen 2700
RTX 2070
16GB RAM
ADATA SSD
1920x1080
[/td]
[td]The game ran without incident on default settings.
💖 - IL is healthy
[/td]
[/tr]
[/table]
