We’re all so inured to the mouthy, screaming cacophony of mismatched ideas, images and sounds that has come to represent the gaming industry that the merest hint of clarity of purpose – of elegance – makes us weep.
I’m crying right now. Big, manly tears, but tears nonetheless.
I’m playing Cogs and it is genuinely elegant. It’s possibly the first steam-punk puzzle game, and this core creative decision has an impact on every part of the game.
Gameplay
At heart, Cogs is simply a classic sliding block puzzle of the sort you played with when you were 6, surreptitiously trying to spell out rude words. Now, in the magic world of your imagination, replace those letters with gears and pipes and you’re 90% of the way to imagining Cogs.
But…
…that’s like saying Star Wars is a film about a big metal ball being bombed by a man with a bad haircut. The elegance is all in the execution, and the inventive stretching of this basic premise.
Each puzzle has a clear aim, usually along the lines of ‘ring the bell’ or ‘get this big cog to turn’, ‘or pipe the steam into the balloon’. These become increasingly challenging as you go further down the list of puzzles. Suddenly, you’re asked to get the wheels to turn hammers which strike bells which play tunes… in time. If you make a mistake you’re going to have to do some fancy switching around to get back into synchronisation – not an easy task.
Rather cleverly, the puzzles aren’t always played on 2D surfaces. Sometimes the puzzles form sizes of a cube, or a two-sided surface. In some cases these faces are independent, while in others, they have to be solved as part of one continuous puzzle, or worse, simultaneously.
As an aid to re-playability, each level has additional challenges associated with it. You are awarded stars for completing the puzzle in a small number of moves or in a short time. Completists (or those with a predilection for having cigarettes stubbed out on their tongue) will have a great deal of fun trying to beat the challenges set by the team. I swear I’d have to grow additional opposable thumbs to do this myself. Being only bi-thumbed, I have gained the full 10 stars on only the first puzzle.
Controls
The controls are very simple. Tap a block and the row or column of blocks will move to fill the empty space. Swipe two fingers across the screen and you can rotate around the puzzle. That’s it. Very simple. Very iPhone. Very responsive. Very good.
Graphics
I’m not particularly keen on games that use 3D merely so they can trumpet, “Look it’s like in Free Dee an everyfing!” like mindless howler monkeys. Cogs uses the 3D cleverly. Without it, some of the puzzles would simply not have fitted on the screen, so instead they are folded into elegant (see, that word again) 3D forms which seem quite natural. All of the menus are also rendered in 3D, swinging smoothly into view, folding up and rotating out toward you much as you’d expect Heath Robinson’s morning breakfast tray might have. Maybe.
All the elements of the game are rendered in wood and brass, a golden brown palette that is reminiscent of sepia photographs of men with pocket-watches and women with infeasibly large posteriors. Not a piece feels out of place. You’re in Cog’s world, so sit back and enjoy the ride; even if it is in a strange horseless carriage.
Sound
Clank! Hiss! Whirr! Ping! This and many more suitably mechanical sounds can be heard throughout the game. The music is also suitably serene and reserved; violins and bells playing waltzes which add to the general atmosphere and conviction of the whole piece. It fits – like everything else.
Overall
It’s not often that a game comes out and feels quite so ‘together’ as Cogs. Lazy 8’s love for their inspiration oozes through every pore of the experience.
The game is relatively inexpensive at $0.99/£0.59 for the first 11 levels. It is, however, one of ‘those’ games that charges an additional fee for extra content: in this case $0.99/£0.59 for each subsequent pack of 10 puzzles purchased.
This seems more than fair considering the quality of the work overall, and I wouldn’t hesitate to recommend this to someone I wished to respect me thereafter.
Victoria would have been amused.
Available on iTunes (iTunes Link)
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Categories: The Feed, TheMacFeed Reviews:, iPhone Apps
