If I were forced to give a one-word review of Braid it would be: dense. So very quickly Braid informs us that it intends to be familiar and different. The player begins in front of a gorgeously drawn city that glows so bright it looks aflame. After minor experimentation we find that the controls are simple: a button for jumping and one for rewinding time, with the control pad moving our hero Tim. The game plays almost like familiar platforming games. Hell, one level even pays homage to the arcade classic Donkey Kong. Yet, after entering the first building in Braid we are greeted with World 2. Then, rather than give a tutorial first, the developer presents us with an essay about love and the world, or something like that. Suddenly nothing looks familiar anymore.
Then come the smaller puzzles, one piece of Braids all encompassing obtuse puzzle. At first they start slowly, simply, like block puzzles for children. Tim needs to figure some things out. To do this he needs to collect puzzle pieces inside of each level. Reaching the pieces seems easy, but most of the games puzzles involve figuring out how to reach them. Forget everything youve learned about games. That silly video game logic that got you through some terrible knock-off franchise wont work with Braid. When standard logic has failed you, begin to look at things differentlyyouve most likely overlooked something obvious. In Braid nothing works like it appears to, and time itself is transformed into a malleable substance.
All of the puzzles involve time manipulation, and while this may not seem the case at first, thats because those are the simple ones. Soon they become more and more clever, yet never out of reach of the players understanding of time. Once the first few areas are complete a satisfaction of mastery sets in only to suddenly be torn away when a new quirk of time manipulation sets in.
New objects, which are not effected by time the same way that normal objects are, make their appearance. I remember the first time I experimented with these new items; my brain seemed to twist inside my skull. It was unnatural to think logically under these circumstances. Then I remembered a scene from Bill and Teds Excellent Adventure. It was towards the end of the movie when Bill and Ted have been captured. Theyre in a cage trying to figure out how to escape when one of the time-traveling duo says, I know! Well just go back in time after this is all sorted out, get the key, and place it under here for us now, in the present time. Then they reach under there and pull out a key. Hey, in the 80s we thought it was hilarious.
Anyways, that kind of crazy time-travel logic is the key to unlocking Braids puzzles. Oh, and it only gets worse after that. Each level challenges the player to understand a new wrinkle in the way that time works.
If this all seems like a huge drag, I apologize because, really, it isnt. Everything about the way that Braid works is so uniquely brilliant. The steps it takes to carefully lull a new player into a sense of comfort about the illogical, yet insuring that veteran players are also appeased, is insightful. Braid is an anthology of so many emotional high points in gaming that it seems like luck all the right pieces fell together allowing its creation. Nearly all parts fit together to form a singular experience unlike anything else.
The controls for most of the game are deceptively simple. The two-button approach to gameplay makes sure that those familiar with the genre can focus on their finesse of control, and new players can quickly acquaint themselves. There are six main levels, each with their own spin on time control. Though the rules of time carry over from one level to the next, some of the abilities that Tim has dont. In one of the later levels gives Tim a time-controlled shadowkind of like a ghost car in Mario Kart. In another we have access to a bubble/ring that slows down time in approximation to its center. Whenever a new element of time control is introduced I promise youll feel muscles in your brain flexing for the first time ever.
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