SPRINTER, developed by Light Step Games, is the type of game that lulls you in with its minimalist design, and then takes a hold of you with it's challenging levels, music, and emotional story depicted in only pictures. As you play through the game you will be asked to complete more tasks, and take on more obstacles, but the one thing that you'll always be doing is sprinting. This game is all about reaction time, rhythm, and speed. Can you get through all the levels so that you can see the whole story?
Graphically I have to say that even though this game doesn't have anything that pops, there is something to be said about its very simple appearance. There's nothing to really distract the player from where they are in the level and what they have to do. Basically the only thing that has color in the levels is the background and then the areas that you have to complete/trigger something to happen. As I mentioned about the story is told through pictures, and to be a little bit more descriptive it happens in sets of 3 Polaroid pictures. The middle picture is the current event, while the outside two try to give context to the story. Throughout most of the game these pictures help add a depth to the story, and make you wonder about the three individuals that this story is based around.
The controls for a game like this have to be tight, there can't be any lag, or any input issues that would take away from the game. Since there is a time limit to each level, and you have to time the pressing of buttons to complete tasks, almost to perfection, if the controls aren't working, the game would fall apart. The good thing is that for the most part these controls are spot on, my only real issue is when it comes to the sections where you have to jump over sections. For some reason that mechanic was the worst of them all, now that's not to say that it didn't work, but I felt that this was the one thing YOU HAD to get perfect otherwise it wouldn't work. Most of the other actions had a little bit of wiggle room to keep you going.
I have heard that it is possible to get through the entire game in 17 minutes, but that's if you are the master of all that is this game. I personally have spent over 2 hours and still have not found the end. Have I failed on levels? You better believe it. Have I almost quit in frustration because I couldn't seem to complete a level? Absolutely, but I keep coming back. The reason I do so is that this game makes you feel like you are so close to being able to string everything together to advance, and so you rinse and repeat.
Now I will admit that this game isn't for everyone, this is a very challenging game, that you're not going to be getting much relaxation out of, but in the challenge you will definitely feel accomplishment as you pass stages that at one time you thought were going to be impossible to defeat. This game definitely deserves a spot in gamer's libraries, and with that I have to say that this game gets a 9.2 out of 10.
