Review: Fez

In previous reviews, I’ve made mention of my ‘indie game shortlist’ – a list I keep handy of all the smaller-scale titles I’ve been watching as I wait for them to be released. If you took a look at that list you’d see Fez all the way at the top, because it’s the game I’ve been waiting the longest and been most eager for. First announced in 2007, creator Phil Fish has long made jokes out of the game’s seemingly endless development cycle by the team at Polytron. Finally released to Xbox Live this week, the five-year wait is over and gamers can finally embark on an adventure in the unique platforming world they have developed.

The game follows the story of Gomez, a…well…he’s a little white marshmallow-looking guy. Voyaging out of his 2D house into his flat little home town, Gomez ascends the mountain to meet the village elder who tells him his adventure is about to begin…any minute now.

In a flash of light, the glorious golden hexahedron appears, introduces him to the third dimension, gives him the titular fez and explodes, crashing the game. When he resets and wakes up in his bed again, Gomez sets out on a quest to find and reunite these scattered cubes to restore the hexahedron and stop his world from slowly coming apart at the seams.

Much like Gomez’s perception of the world, the game’s gameplay has both a face value and a deeper level of gameplay behind it. In essence, this is a platformer title which sees you running, jumping and scrambling across the world, collecting cube bits as you come across them. The deeper level of gameplay however, comes from how Gomez’s new ability to rotate his 2D world in 3D can suddenly move a distant treasure chest to only a quick hop away. Working your way through each of the many ‘levels’ that make up the game world involves wrapping your brain around the way each area can change and transform as you flip it 90 degrees. The sheer level of lateral thinking required to DESIGN these levels is beyond me, as my brain scrabbled to understand the changing landscapes a simple button press unlocked.

As you progress through the game you’re shown locked doors that you can only open by collecting a certain number of cubes (made up of 8 scattered cube bits) or anti-cubes, rewarded by harder puzzles and secret areas. There’s also a deeper level to the game beyond this, with fragments of a secret language scattered through the levels waiting to be translated with the ciphers cleverly woven into the game. The best of these hints was a large section of text accompanied by a lazy dog, being pestered by a quick brown fox jumping quickly over him. Sound familiar?

The whole world is presented as a stunning pixel artwork, with critters dashing around the place in all the glory of Technicolor. These environs vary wildly from area to area; crumbling cities, deep forests, volcanoes, caves, neon dystopias, vast mountainsides and monochrome sewers all featuring in varying palettes with unique musical accompaniments. It’s easy to get lost within the game world, as you can move rapidly between doorways scattered around until you’re unsure how to get back. The map system is confusing at first, but helpfully turns each completed are a golden hue in the interface once you’ve collected all the cubes and secrets it has to offer.

You can reach the game ‘ending’ relatively early in your explorations, but there is far more to find beyond what is required to reach the endgame areas. A new ability unlocked once you’ve viewed this ending will assist you in unlocking the greater mysteries of the 2D-3D world, enabling you to collect every collectible this world has to offer you. After initially handwaving away the bigger puzzles and language decoding, I found myself pulling out pen and paper to jot down notes and possibly important details anyway. This is one title I’ll definitely be trying to 100% before I shelve it – just don’t judge me if I Google for a little help now and then. My brain’s out of practice on these Lost-esque puzzles-within-puzzles stuff!

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