Late to the party as always, a surprise gift of Microsoft Points finally allowed me to jump in on the Limbo bandwagon as I was unwilling to pay $15 for a game this reputedly short (though apparently satisfying).
Set in an dream-like world of foggy black and white, Limbo is a side-scrolling physics puzzle-platformer, but it is also so much more. The player controls a boy, silhouetted in pitch black along with the midground elements, with baroque and distorted foreground and background elements fading to grey smudges.
Borrowing heavily from German Expressionism for its visual style, Limbo also leans on elements from The Lord of the Flies and common phobias (spiders, parasites). All elements are well suited to the abstract world and are surrounded by ethereal music and sound design. The environment changes from an insect and arachnid infested forest to a dilapidated but trap laden urban environment, culminating in the dangerous gravity challenging bowels of factory.
What struck me immediately were the snappy yet whimsical animations that told both story and character, yet functionally obeyed the procedural rules of the engine. Physics dominates the gameplay, requiring an understanding motion and momentum as applied solutions to extremely clever puzzles. I often forgot that all things in the world have weight, and behave as such, leading to constant 'DOH' moments when a puzzle would finally work. Approaching play as a gamer hindered me, because I always looked first to the trite gameplay solution, rather than the real-world physics based solution.
My wife, a non-gamer, was entranced immediately by Limbo. The opaque visuals and the Grimm's Fairy Tales-esque graphic but not explicit violence drew her in, evoking empathy and wonder. Glimpses into the world and its inhabitants led to questions about the state of this reality, and if this dreamlike environment was in fact a dream.
Limbo is evocative without preening, and has no pretense. It is somber and the joy of each puzzle solved or trap evaded is muted by the constant danger of what is next in a world created to kill you.
Always leaving more questions than answers, Limbo is indeed insanely short, but satisfying.
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