LIO

[b]3/10[/b] An interesting art experience, with a little bit of puzzling inside. Looking at most other reviews, almost nobody made it past the first level, and they either totally hate it, or praise the art but still didn’t finish the first level. This is mainly an art experiment and showcase, with a few playable levels tucked in between a bunch of clips. First, the art. You start by watching a few clips, and after every level you are awarded with a few more clips. These are supposed to tell the story behind the game, the motivation for why you keep trying to reach the big crystal. Unlike in most other games with a narrative, these aren’t clear stories, they're not even clear images, but surreal, abstract, vague, impressionist, or other fuzzy styles of moving pictures, accompanied by strange sounds or eerie music. The story isn’t told, but suggested. See white grass swaying in the wind. Watch a dark puddle turn red. Hear punches against a few shimmering shadows. What the hell is going on? What [b]the hell[/b] is going on??? And these clips really stretch the little patience I have, and if you’ve read my other reviews, you probably know how little patience I have. They go on for minutes, with nothing but the same vague moving image. After every clip, you get a little bit more clarity in the form of a text blurb slowly being typed, describing what happened in the clip as the thoughts of the protagonist. Are the clips any good? Is this good art? Well, art is subjective. In the real world, a white canvas sells for millions, paint splatters are among the most coveted art pieces, and colored squares of paint are a real major genre. These clips aren’t impressive for their realism or high quality, yet I like them. Art is subjective, and these may not be for everybody, but no work of art trully is for everybody. Then, the actual puzzles. As far as I can tell, there are four levels, 3 isometric and one 3D. In all these levels the goal is to draw a line from one crystal to another, but only through dark/empty space, without touching any white object. The three isometric levels have been compared to Monument Valley, but that’s not a very good comparison. You walk on the thin edges of a 3D shape, and you are expected to fall between certain points. But while in Monument Valley objects that looked connected became connected and allowed you to move between them, here edges on different levels may or may not be truly on the same axis, so falling from one higher place may land you on another edge, or you may fall through. And you never know before jumping which way it is. These levels are frustrating beyond belief, it is normal to play and replay the same short level for more than an hour before you even start getting an idea of what you’re even supposed to do. First, movement is atrocious, since this was first a phone game, you click and drag in the direction you want to move, but the input is broken and movement doesn’t follow the exact path you draw, but goes slightly above or under, only perfectly vertical or horizontal lines are respected, the rest is skewed one way or another. And the edges that you walk on are so thin that even a little misstep means you fall to your death. And every time you die you are forced to take a break, watching the guy fall, then fade to black, then wait in the dark, then see a weird random message, then more waiting, then the level finally fades in again and you can retry. So, a few tens of minutes wasted just trying to walk across the first edge and around the first corner. Then, once you start getting the hang of walking without accidentally falling, you have to start to intentionally fall from all the different places trying to find out the one spot on one edge that lets you land on a different edge underneath, and not to your death, and die and repeat and die and repeat until slowly you start building a path through the level. Plus, there's timing involved, during the last fall you must also quickly draw the path between the two crystals while a black piece is moving over a white shape. And that was just the first level! It took me ninety minutes to crack it. It is not a thinky level, but a precision platformer with broken input, misleading layout, unfun discovery, and a lot of long forced breaks between tries. The following two levels are similar, with a few extra twists, but after the first level they were much quicker to crack. The fourth level changed the gameplay to something even worse, you have to draw a 2D line in a shifting 3D environment avoiding objects while you have no idea where the head of the line is in relation to the 3D environment, and you have to do that four or five times. And that was half the game. Next, you have to replay the same levels, but this time on hard mode (!) with two extra challenges, one of which is always to do it ultra fast, and the other varies in each level. So far I couldn't solve any of them, I’m not fast and precise enough to also kick a football between these edges, or run fast enough between checkpoints while avoiding the evil clones, or figure out what I am supposed to do in the dark void. As a “fun” game, this is a complete failure, it is barely a game, and no fun at all. As a grueling game, this is a great success, managing to consume so much time with only four levels. As an art experiment, this is very interesting, but also not very well done, which is true for most art not from the Renaissance-Romantic period. Should you play it? It’s free, all you have to waste is your time, see if it speaks to you as an experimental art piece. It certainly is unique. [quote]For more puzzle game reviews, news and everything puzzle-related, follow [url=https://store.steampowered.com/curator/25928931-Puzzle-Lovers/]Puzzle Lovers[/url] and check out our [url=http://steamcommunity.com/groups/puzzlelovers]Steam group[/url].[/quote] [quote]Follow [url=https://store.steampowered.com/curator/32732116-IndieGems/]IndieGems[/url] for more reviews like this one.[/quote]

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I can not express how ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ the controls and feel of this game is. Music is good and the gameplay could be solid, but i want to fist fight whoever decided swipe to control a character with these perspectives was a good choice. I want to experience more, but i also don't want to punch my monitor. So ill wait till someone finishes this game and posts it on youtube.

Very unstable and clunky movement which makes you to fall down all the time if you aren't very very very careful while moving. While you draw a line you need to pass it through a narrow space, you need to be fast because you need good timing with the environment objects. All these on the level 1... yeah i couldn't even pass the level 1 -_-

This is so beautiful and promising! The levels look sleek and cohesive, straight out of isometric "modern" phone games like Monument Valley. Sadly, I ended up playing the first level for almost half an hour and closing the game in discouragement. The player movement controls are just too clunky on PC for the game to have any fluidity. Acclimating to the movement controls in the first level is tedious, but part of the expected ride. However, after likely dying a handful of times just learning the movement (and which platforms are even safe to jump from) the player is required to input a [i] quick [/i] and [i] precise [/i] mouse drag. The movement controls would be ok, especially in a game that openly asks for your patience, but it ends up just feeling frustrating paired with the kaizo-like unclear platforming. The internal path creation puzzle is brilliant, but the fast expected reaction and movement feels contradictory to all the gameplay leading up- and all of the all tags listed here on the store page for that matter.. Overall, this game feels like it has the capacity in its art content alone to be amazing. If the puzzle elements were toned down, changed, or even removed I would gladly come back to finish this beauty.

LIO daha önce gördüğünüz hiçbir şeye benzemeyen bir ürün. Bu sadece bir oyundan daha fazlası; yaratıcısının video oyunu ortamına ilişkin kaotik, yenilikçi ve benzersiz vizyonuna bir bakış. Günümüzün hastalıklı standartlarını karşılamak yerine yalnızca sanatı ve tutkuyu paylaşmaya odaklanan bir video oyunu için tamamen yeni bir temel konsept. Kesinlikle herkese hitap edecek bir ürün değil ancak onu anlayacak olanlar, LIO'yu yeni nesil sanat odaklı etkileşimli deneyimlerin doğuşu olarak anlayacaklardır.

[b]POST REVIEW EDIT[/b] Latest update has addressed these concerns and the developer even removed the insulting achievement. I unfortunately have already lost faith in the game and won't be trying it again even after the changes. I understand this project has a personal meaning to the developer, but poor taste in understanding your market you are releasing to does not give you a pass on what you thought would be taking tongue-in-cheek kind of humor. My review stands, but I welcome others to try it to make your own decision. [b]ORIGINAL REVIEW[/b] Just NO. There is even a freaking steam achievement you get because you cannot complete a single level and quit the game. Is it supposed to be mocking us to try again or be some attempt at humor? Nope. Just shows the developer is brain dead to the world and how things work outside of their visionary bubble. Want people to play your game or artist experience or whatever you want to call this? Don't "adapt from mobile" with a crappy control scheme and expect people to put any time into it. Let me explain: "Adapted from Mobile" as it says in the control settings. Horrible implementation of controls. In the opening sequence it tells you, Headphones, quiet environment, keyboard and mouse as the "preferred" and recommended way to experience this hot mess. Their "adaptation" from mobile is trying to replicate the touch sensitive input from a mobile device by having you hold down the mouse button and drag the mouse around. If you are anyone who has adjusted the mouse movement speed or sensitivity, or I dunno, have a gaming laser mouse for low response times... you're screwed. I have to move with microscopic movements of the mouse in order to accomplish any sort of movements that doesn't instant fail you and restart the level. You tell us to use a keyboard and mouse but then implement this weird movement scheme? How about stick with what is tried and tested and proven to be usable by most gamers in any age group. Arrow Keys or the WASD keys for movement. No brainer.

The game is an absolute must-play if you love solving puzzles and you've got the patience and attention span of someone with a functioning brain. Besides it's free so why not?

I really did not want to dislike this game, it seems so cool. It has a cool art style, a seemingly simple story and puzzles, and it was made in memory of someone who passed... But I really can't like this game. Cutscenes have no way of skipping, which I am usually okay with, but the cutscenes are also levels, meaning that you can accidentally click on a cutscene and be forced to either sit through it, or close the game and reopen it. The first proper level, which I did beat after a lot of trial and error as well as get help from some reviews, was honestly really confusing. The level is actually pretty simple when you understand it, but the game did not help explain how the system even worked. It gave some vague stuff, but the main thing is that it didn't explain that the level isn't what it seems, some parts are actually angled and positioned differently on the axis, making it so you have to get to a specific point to drop down onto a lower part, while parts that seem like a simple walk or drop is actually far off and you fall to your death. I don't know what the later levels are like, they seem to change it up with proper 3D environments, but that first level just left such a bad taste in my mouth, along with the cutscenes, that I honestly just can't give a positive review. Most reviews talk about the game being buggy, but I didn't actually encounter any bugs, just that the game felt a little stiff. I honestly should have expected this, as the most recent post from the devs is an apology for stuff with the game. I think the game could actually be pretty good if they rework the first level a little and add a way to skip cutscenes, especially ones that have already been seen. Until then, I'm keeping my review as a no. 5/10 TL;DR: Unskippable cutscenes and no real explanation of a core aspect of the game. But it has nice art and was in memory of someone who passed away. I'm sure the game is better later on, but at the state it's in, the game is not the best. Try it out if you're really curious though.