[quote]A review copy was provided by the developer.[/quote]
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[h1]Overall Rating - Seriously Flawed ★★☆☆☆[/h1]
[h1]First Impressions[/h1]
Every so often, a relaxing puzzle is a nice break and breath of fresh air in-between more invigorating or difficult games. That's why I was interested by The Far Kingdoms: Magic Mosaics (MM). Even though it's almost a year old and only has a single review, when I looked at YouTube footage of how it functioned, I thought it looked not only harmless, but like it might have some features that would make for a good iteration of the picross puzzle style.
[h1]Gameplay[/h1]
Picross, like the best of puzzles, has a very simple design. Using a grid of squares, each row and column has numbers beside them, which indicate how many of the squares are filled in. The complexity increases the larger the grid is, though the most common patterns are squares with dimensions of 10X10, 15X15, or 20X20. In theory, they could take on different sizes or be uneven, such as a 10X15, or Heaven forbid, 13X13. Knowing the size is a crucial clue, as the player will use nothing but counting and deduction to figure out what squares have to be filled in and which ones can't be. Any line with a 0 will immediately be blanked out, while those the same size as the grid will be completely filled out. If you have an interest in picross, I recommend looking into a video tutorial over the basic mechanics.
What tends to be the allure of picross is that the seemingly random numbers and patterns of squares will create an image of some sort. It'll be a very basic, pixelated rendition, but for older gamers we're used to that anyways. Plus, the larger the grid, the more potential for it to be a complex and clearer facsimile. MM also includes more than a single color, which is the default for picross. With only one game mode available, you'll clear puzzle after puzzle, making a bit of story progress intermittently, until you beat the game.
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2808911303
[h1]Controls[/h1]
Considering that the old school version of picross would be done with pencil and paper (pens for the hardcore crowd), I can't complain about using a mouse to save myself the hassle of the analog version of MM. I did switch back and forth between my laptop and desktop, but even when I used the trackpad, the controls still worked fine. Definitely not as smooth and precise as using the mouse, but that'd be my own fault.
[h1]Story[/h1]
When the game started, a fireball flew around and a wizard appeared in the middle of a dank, dangerous looking forest. He talked to me like I was supposed to recognize him and know that I was a princess who could help him figure out how to fix his magical mishap, somehow. I double-checked the store page and didn't see anything to suggest this was a sequel, but apparently The Far Kingdoms is a series of some sort. For me though, all I kept thinking was, who are you people, who am I, and what am I getting out of all this hassle? Theoretically it's gold coins to fix up my kingdom, but was there anything wrong with it before, or am I just blinging it out?
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2808911081
[h1]Visuals[/h1]
For the main gameplay portion of MM, it's by nature incredibly simple, because it's a grid system made up of squares. What's important is to keep everything clean, easy to see, and for players to know the difference between blanked out squares, filled-in squares, and neutral squares, which is done well here. All of the information I needed, such as what square I was hovering over and where it lies compared to the rest of the grid was presented distinctly by shading the row and column I was on. The background images and hub are sufficient, although I can't help but think it looks rather generic, like you'd see in any puzzle game.
[h1]Sound Design[/h1]
I'd describe the background music for MM as a type of ambient noise, as it's primarily made up of long, drawn-out tones and chimes. Occasionally there's a few shorter notes that twinkle through it, but it's a slow, soothing type of tune you might listen to while sipping tea and reflecting on life. It's not quite my thing, but I can see how it fits well.
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2808911450
[h1]Pros[/h1]
🌟 When you complete all of the correct filled squares in a row or column, it'll blank out any remaining unfilled squares for you automatically. It'll also fill in portions of other rows or columns based on what completing the row or column means for them, though I'm not positive how the algorithm works and when it determines you've ruled out enough information to auto-blank particular areas. When it does though, it's very handy.
🌟 Each puzzle makes use of three colors, making for more interesting images than what I might normally expect from a picross game.
[h1]Cons[/h1]
❌ The tutorial covers the very basics of how picross plays, but not the slightly more advanced strategies and things to look out for in order to logically work your way through the puzzle. For instance, how to count and fill in partial rows or columns based on the number and which squares have to be filled in by logic. It stops a bit too early.
❌ If you want to take a break, you can't quit out of a puzzle halfway through and return to how you left it earlier.
[h1]Tips[/h1]
🔍 The game gives away more information than it should at times. For instance, a color in the middle of a row might cross off a 1 in a column. This means you can block off the squares above and below it, though you shouldn't necessarily know at the time that you found the 1 for that column when it could have been another number.
🔍 At the start of each puzzle, switch to all the colors to see if there's one or two really small, easy ones you can clear or mostly clear right away. It may not seem like much, but they'll remove some areas in what could otherwise be a complete dead end. After all, one color almost always dominates the picross.
[h1]Final Thoughts[/h1]
Although I enjoy features of MM, in some ways it comes across like it was rushed out the door. With how the story is presented I'm truly baffled because you don't even see the protagonist or find out anything about her background as the princess, let alone how she knows anybody else. Besides, there's so little to the story, with no further dialogue popping up in-between puzzles, that it hardly adds anything to the game. If it's going to be this slipshod, why bother at all?
Additionally, the tutorial covers such a surface level aspect of picross, it acts like the player would be a total noob, but doesn't go nearly far enough into the intricacies of how those puzzles work for an inexperienced player to have any idea what to do. They'd be lost before long, as the puzzles start getting difficult faster than what I expected from the cutesy visuals. If you only want more picross puzzles to solve and care about nothing else, MM would suffice, but I think it lacks polish and wouldn't recommend getting it.
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[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 mostly ran without incident on default settings. However, I did notice occasional stuttering while playing, which I found rather odd with how small and simple the game is.
💖 - MM is healthy
[/td]
[/tr]
[/table]
