Caught In Limbo

The first game of the Summer of Arcade (Winter of Arcade for fellow Aussies) is a game called Limbo. I'd heard absolutely nothing about the game, but my friend picked it up and kept raving about it so i figured i'd check it out too. Now i can only wonder how i didn't know about Limbo. The game is very simplistic in nature... There is no real story, no actual background music, the game is a 2D puzzle game and the entire game is presented in a stylised monochromatic look. Basically you take control of a little boy (who i've heard is named Limbo, for for simplicities sake, i'm calling him Bob) who has to traverse a strange environment filled with deadly creatures, sharp spikes and countless places for him to plunge to his doom. That's really all there is to it... You have endless lives and the real fun of the game is purely from trying to figure out the best way to help Bob make his way through Limbo without ending up as a spiders dinner. The puzzles are really well done, the look is something quite unique that also helps make the puzzles that much harder and despite having no soundtrack, the ambient noises are enough to give you the creeps at times. Limbo manages to focus itself on the puzzles, and leave everything else up to your imagination... Maybe Bob is questing through a dark land to rescue a princess, maybe he's lost and trying to find his way home, it doesn't really matter because the only goal the game gives you is to keep him alive. I haven't enjoyed a puzzle game this much since Portal.