I cannot recommend this enough but the authors of Samorost (and other beautiful games such as Questionaut), Amanita Design, have finally released their most beautiful of pieces, the long awaited Machinarium.
Essentially it is a point-and-click adventure game, and this is how you progress through the story however the rewards that go beyond the ‘game’ side of things are the music and the artwork and the beautifully tender realisation they have put into it.
Case in point is that for every stunning page of the adventure if you click up in the top right hand corner of the screen there is a locked book. The lock itself is a small and simple mini-game which just takes simple co-ordination and a minute or so but at the end unlocks and then shows you a wonderfully illustrated and detailed explanation of the puzzle on the screen, those illustrations on their own are a gift enough (Jakub Dvorský, one of the creators of the game told me that there are three different illustrators who contributed to the Walkthrough book so the style is also varied).
Amanita Design have done something so subtle that I don’t think I’ve ever seen in a game before which is actually to create a storybook within which you live. Because the puzzles through the game, though being fun and interesting, with the walkthrough book mentioned above are a gentle framework and never a threat, however it is the story, sound and artwork are the beef to the piece.
I’ve asked Mr Dvorský whether they would issue a printed book of all the artwork and he said he’d love to so if any of my publishing friends are out there you should seriously strike now!!!
The game itself is $20 and as I said I cannot recommend it enough and if you want to indulge in a taster play Samorost and Samorost 2 as well as the Machinarium demo if that’s not enough to convince you.
Well done Amanita!!
