Machinarium Review

Machinarium: A Robot Love Story

I like point and click adventures. They’re the kind of game I enjoyed when I was younger and continue to be the kind of game I feel most comfortable playing. I think what I like about them is the idea that everything on the screen is what you need to complete the task. If not, there are clues to get you through. You’re in safe territory, able to move through the game and enjoy the plot or the scenery, or both.

What a shame Machinarium, visually impressive as it is, doesn’t tick all of those boxes.

The game was developed by Czech company Amanita Designs, who put their own time and savings into making it. That alone impressed me when I first came across it. The beautiful thing about Machinarium is obviously the world they created. In a lovely sepia tone, Amanita has set up a junk planet populated by cute little robots. They frolick in oil, play music and go out their funny little lives. But there are some bad guys too, notably three bullies who are the reason for this adventure. They’ve separated two lovebots and the … well, I assume it’s the boy robot, is left in pieces on a junk heap.

From there it’s a matter of getting your bot back together and getting back into the city. In creating such a rich backdrop for the story, Amanita have decided to make only the useable items on the screen clickable and this makes sense in the first screen. It seems intuitive, with finding the pieces of the little bot easy.

So far, so good. But the second screen is where the frustration begins. So soon into a game and warning signs start going off in my head. The set up is, you watch a Policebot salute and go across a drawbridge. When you try it, you’re told – by the innovative pictographic ‘speech’ the robots employ – that you don’t look like a cop, so you’re not going anywhere, Sonny Jim. I pressed the ‘clue’ lightbulb in the top right corner, in order to figure out what I needed to do, but all it did was reiterate what I already knew. The next option is to play a minigame to open a book which apparently would give me a step by step walkthrough.

The minigame itself was nuts! It’s basic idea was a side-scrolling Paradius-style game where you fly a key through a maze, with some spiders. I never made it through. It was hard to control and unbelievably touchy. You could come two pixels close to something and die. They only reason I know that you can open the book and see a pictographic representation of what you should do, is because someone on the net screencapped it. The shame of resorting to walkthroughs is mine, and so is the frustration.

And from here on in, Machinarium goes from tricky to difficult to mindbending insanity.

I can honestly say that without the step by step walkthrough, I would not have finished this game. I probably wouldn’t have gotten past the third or fourth screen either. To me, point and clicks are supposed to be intuitive. You’re meant to be able to get an idea of what you’re meant to do next from either dialogue (none in this game), the plot progression (no hints there) or it’s the logical thing to do (eg: there’s a key, there is a keyhole, put key in keyhole and turn the lock).

On the flipside, as Matt pointed out to me, the old style Sierra games were just like this – difficult, fiddly and without help. You had to plug your way through the games, through trial and error, taking as much time as a modern RPG would now. So perhaps it’s just that I’m used to the easier, family friendly games of the kind made by LucasArts. Still doesn’t take away from the fact that I rage quit nine times. Conversations with friends confirmed that they found it damn difficult too.

Qualms with the difficulty aside, I really did love the world the game is set in. It’s beautiful, quaint and there’s a certain soft sense of humour too. There is so much detail in those screens: little robots going about their work, houses, towers, stairs, robot animals and handymen. But that can cause a bit of trouble too, as there can be so many little bits and pieces that you’re never quite sure what you’re looking for. Though you eventually find what you’re after, I spent a a few minutes each screen systematically clicking on a few dozen random objects in the hope that it was an item I could collect. It could kind of spoil the mood.

The Verdict

Pros: A beautiful world and original characters are lovely to look at. The lack of dialogue is made up for with pictographic thought bubbles, adding to the quaint feeling of the game. It’s the atmosphere of the game that makes it playable.

Cons: So frustrating and so unintuitive. If you have little patience for braintwisters or just want to play a simple game, this is not for you.

Overall: A gorgeous game visually, but not for the casual gamer. It’s one you have to put time and effort into. While that’s not such a bad thing really, you’ll need an iron patience to play for an extended amount of time.  2.5 out of 5.