austrian otaku

Most likely you haven’t heard about Machinarium yet. But if you like the idea of playing a game which is kind of unique you might want to check out this short review.

Machinarium was released a few weeks ago for worldwide online purchase and runs on Windows, Mac and Linux. You can get it via the official homepage (where you can play a few demo levels online).

The PC version is also available via Steam, Direct2Drive, Gamersgate and Impulse for ~15€ / 22USD / 2000Yen.

I ordered the boxed version which is available in German, Russian and Italian since Tuesday for example here on amazon.de.

Besides the game CD (yes, a CD!) which contains Samorost 2 too, you will find the soundtrack, the manual and a double sided poster inside.

You will notice that the whole game is hand drawn but the great artwork and animations generate 3D feel which is really great.

The world of Machinarium is some sort of post-apocalyptic retro robot world. All buildings, devices the robots themselves look like made out of mechanical parts, tubes and other stuff left behind from a former civilisation in my opinion.

After starting the game you will see a flying-something-robot-thingy delivering trash to a dump outside a town somewhere in the middle of a deserted landscape.

In this first level, which serves as tutorial too, you have to put the games hero together who was dissembled  because of the harsh “delivery” before. The hero is a little robot, going by the name Josef. This little fella has some useful skills: You can stretch or clinch his body in three different positions which is necessary to pass the game. On his journey Josef finds a lot of stuff lying around which has to be assembled, dissembled or arranged in a certain way to get some mechanisms to work. To carry those parts around he simply “eats” them and it looks like he has an unlimited amount of storage space. ^_^

After putting him back together Josef is heading back to the town, where he comes across a plot by gang of criminal robots who plan to bomb the city’s tallest tower and kidnapped his beloved robot girlfriend too.

Some ingame footage below:

What’s interesting is that that the game manages to tell a story containing a conspiracy and also a love plot without a single word. Especially as it does it in funny way.

All you will hear are some speech like noise together with such comic like speech bubbles as in the screenshot above.

If you don’t do anything for a while Josef will display some random speech bubbles too, containing some memories, mostly from his girlfriend.

There are some games inside the game itself too. You have to play space invaders in the gaming arcade up there on the left to get some money for example.

If you are really stuck somewhere you can click on the hint button on the top right. Josef gives you a hint, displayed in a bubble of course. Still not able to figure it out? There’s a a walkthrough book on the top right too, but don’t use it if you don’t have to. It’s way better to think little bit longer.

If finished the game after playing a few hours on two evenings. The end was a little bit abruptly but I have played well know games which I were shorter, way more boring and more expensive in the past. The way who you have to do all those puzzles is always unique as well as funny and creative.

If you like to use your brain while gaming I highly recommend giving Machinarium a try.

As Machinarium is a European game, created by a small independent company, this post isn’t Japan related. But I just had to blog about this piece of digital art.

But for those eager to have some J-stuff in this post too: Bad Apple (with English subs)

Can’t get enough of this song. \o/