The opening scene thrusts you into this world without any explanation for your predicament. You play as a young child who finds himself lying on his back in a foreign land that is far from welcoming. He is virtually featureless, appearing as a black silhouette that frequently blends in with the dark surroundings you must travel through. His lone distinctive characteristic is his shining, white eyes. These flashes of light are always visible, making it the one part of his body you can recognize even when the rest of the screen is completely black. There is no story pushing you through this quest, no signs to give you hints nor characters to clue you in on an overarching plot. Rather, this is a game about survival, where merely making it from one area to the next, surviving one obstacle after another, is what pushes you on.
The subdued aesthetics more than make up for the lack of an elaborate tale, using subtle audio hooks and restrained visuals to guide you further along your destined path. Limbo is fully realized in shades of black and white. You walk through dense forests, decrepit towns, and abandoned factories, all of which feel confining and desolate, creating an ominous sense of entrapment. There is a hazy flicker at all times, a film-grain grit that makes the world of Limbo feel tarnished and unclean. For the majority of your adventure, there is no music to accompany you along the way. Instead, there are quiet ambient noises that slowly fade into and out of existence. A patter of raindrops or rustle of wind is sometimes cued up, or a quiet chirping from crickets. But there are moments when music does kick in. A heavy bass note will crash down or a light melody will briefly start up, and these tie in beautifully with your onscreen actions.
You have a small repertoire of moves to help you stay alive in this 2D puzzle/platformer hybrid. A modest jump allows you to clear small gaps; certain objects can be pushed or pulled; and you can climb up or swing from ropes. Submerging yourself too deep in water, falling from a high ledge, or making contact with any of the numerous traps will kill you instantly, sending you back to the previous checkpoint. Your lack of heroic moves does not mean that the puzzles you must overcome are equally limited, though. There’s plenty of variety in Limbo’s puzzles, and even those that appear similar initially are invariably quite different. The early puzzles are single-step affairs that require you to move a bear trap out of the way or cross a river. But later puzzles are much more complex, forcing you to use objects, flip switches, and perform perfect jumps in order to come out on top.
0 коммент.:
Post a Comment