The Message from Deep Space

There are some parts of it that feel unfair, the aliens just expecting me to pull out a random word from several transmissions ago without prompting and not accepting valid synonyms for the term, but for the most part this was an extremely good game that I was happy to complete.

крута гра з шикарною атмосферою та прикольним геймплеєм всім хто шарить в інгліше та любить головоломки сердечно рекомендується

Very good puzzle game--highly recommend to fans of Chants of Sennaar. Don't be afraid to ask questions in the discord server!

Despite the thumbs up, I'm going to mostly have negative things to say about this game. If you want to live the "decoding an alien language" fantasy, this game is *it*. Thumbs up. If you don't overwhelmingly need that in your life, and are just e.g. looking for a good puzzle game? Thumbs down. Basically this is not a well designed or implemented game, and it's a shame because it could have been so much better so easily. This review is written after what I think is about a quarter of the game. About every 5th puzzle has me wanting to flip the table because there's something so obviously wrong with its construction. A super long demonstration of a new concept that doesn't actually properly disambiguate it. Sloppy use vs. mention problem. Puzzles where the answer is not at all what it should be based on past examples. Puzzles where you just have to read the designer's mind. This kind of artifact would be a civilization's crowning achievement. Real care would be put into optimizing the curriculum. None of that comes through here. The message format is not well designed, and there is no curriculum, it's just a collection of seemingly auto-generated puzzles. And the game is just *so slow*. Verifying an answer takes so long. Clicking through the cheesy dialogue (two keypresses per line!) takes so long. Doing the 10th repetitive solve of what is fundamentally the same puzzle just to prove that you understood the concept *when you understood it on puzzle 1* is tedious beyond belief. This game needs a "I know the answer, make my teammates solve the puzzle" button so bad. Or if not that, cut out like 3/4 of the puzzles from some of the more repetitive arcs. In the current state it's just too padded to recommend universally, rather than just to the people desperate for a good treatment of cracking a language.

One of the greatest puzzle games I've played, and I've played a lot. Trying to understand the alien language seems realistic in a way I never expected from a game. Maths as a starting point, then building up through universal constants. It's an original concept too, and keeps surprising you by adding complexity from simple beginnings. The reference panel stops you from getting lost thinking down the wrong path for the solution. It's not perfect, and some transmissions are difficult to answer. Not difficult to solve, but difficult to guess the format for. That said, the hints from your co-translators are a big help when you're completely stuck on one. Excellent work from the creator, and a fantastic inspiration as a fellow sci-fi game dev.

Absolutely incredible puzzle game, one of the most engaging I've ever played. The dev is a genius for figuring out how to construct meaning from base principles.

I am very impressed by the ever so slowy increasing difficulty of the game. Every puzzle is both fun and challenging For me the only downside are the cutscenes which are mediocre at best. But hey, they provided a setting to turn them off... so what is there to complain?

I don't want to spoil anything about this game. If you like puzzles and math and a very entertaining story, pick this one up.

I have never known I needed a math puzzle game until now. Highly recommend to everyone. This game breaks down and teaches math and language principles better than any high school course could. Thank you so much for this game and apologies to my college because this has stepped up my expectations for hands on learning. But also it's a great game too, not just number munchers or whatever.

玩到[spoiler] group 70 [/spoiler]左右，强烈地感受到一种玩星际拓荒时的感动。 Reaching about [spoiler] group 70 [/spoiler], a similar sentiment of being moved when playing Outer Wilds strongly hit me.