Introduction

I mentioned in my Death and Taxes article (not scheduled to post until next week) about my experiencs with Humble Bundle. Then, I went on to talk about Fanatical, a new bundle service I tinkered with a couple of months ago. In one of those bundles, I received this game for Steam. I really like it, so I wanted to write one last article about Lair of the Clockwork God early impressions before the Germany trip.

I never heard of the game or the studio. That’s not unusual. While I want to be an indie gaming darling, the truth is that I simply don’t have the time to comb web pages searching for the latest and greatest indie gaming treasures. And, so, I generally play them far after they lose their relevance in the community. But, to paraphrase Jack Sparrow, “I have heard of them.”

Quick Note: I barely played through the first part of the tutorial level to get a feel for the game since I’m on a bit of a time crunch here. After playing the game more, I promise to update my thoughts.

The Decent

The Humor: While funny, some of the humor is a bit too on the nose for me. I like that they took both genres and turned them a bit on their head, but the continued tongue in cheek dialogue between the characters got to be a bit too much for me and I’m only a half hour into game play time. I trust that it might, but I definitely hope that as the plot becomes more complex, the humor will follow.

The Good

Challenge: The game offers just the right amount of challenge, in my opinion. I wrote in my Portal 2 article that I enjoy puzzles in my game. They use the innovative (more on that in a minute) game play to build new and challenging puzzles into the game. Granted, I only made it through part of the tutorial. However, the puzzles made me think but never caused me much frustration. I expect that to challenges to change as the game progresses, but I hope the frustration remains at a minimum.

The Great

Innovative Gameplay: For the amount of times that you hear this from a game, you’d think we’d have more than the half a dozen basic gaming genres that we have. Every once in a while, a game delivers on that promise. I already talked about the different puzzles that this game offers due to the style of the game. Granted, they arrived at this style by mashing together two styles that they enjoy. Even so, the result becomes so much more than the sum of its parts. I know I use the analogy often, but think Reese’s peanut butter cups. Two great games that play great together.

The Verdict

Having only played through part of the tutorial level, I can’t make a judgement. Wait, what? Someone with a reasonable and measured response? I know, I know. Supposed to have a hot take on things as soon as we consume them these days. But, my Lair of the Clockwork God early impressions are I enjoy the game very much. I want to play more. Hell, my wife even noticed me playing and asked what the game was. That’s high praise indeed.