PuzzleReviews

Inked review: A visual masterpiece on pen and paper

A must play puzzle platformer which takes you on a quest of love and hope

Inked, a puzzle platformer first came to Steam for PC back in April 2018 and was applauded for its aesthetics. Now that it’s on mobile, those looking for a relaxing game to play can have a go at it. However, the mobile version is a bit different from the PC version. Here in this article, we will review Inked and share our first impressions of the game.


Experience a story of love and hope on paper

Starting off with the Inked review, everything starts with the narration. The narration introduces you to the tale and adds to the beauty of the game. You play as the nameless hero who has given up his sword because everything is peaceful now and is accompanied by your beloved Aiko as you start a journey full of puzzles and a constantly moving story. Often, a person simply referred to as the Artist interjects and helps you solve puzzles.

Inked review

The game is divided into chapters and the puzzles are pretty easy to get to. To move the nameless hero, tap where you want him to go and the pathfinding works pretty well. There are a bunch of things you can interact with as well. To reach a checkpoint, you’d have to solve puzzles which would include pushing carts onto pressure plates, roll balls into holes and pull levers. There are ramps and a bunch of other objects which you can rotate using another finger.

Inked review

There’s a bunch of other cool stuff including fans who move things around by blowing air at them so you have a lot to explore and learn. The game seems to have two extremes though. At times it teaches about new objects you encounter but sometimes it may also leave you on your own to figure out how stuff works so sometimes the game might get a bit harder. Another problem we had were the tacky and clunky controls while rotating objects and it might take a few tries to get it right so the game requires patience. While most puzzles at the start don’t have any time limits, a couple do so you need to pay attention to that. The game has different looks for different environments as well since there’s a desert, a swamp and a cold region and the game has different tones for each of those


Awkward camera angles but a visual delight

The graphics and audio in this game were great. Everything is presented to you in a ballpoint pen on paper graphics and manages to draw in and immerse players into the game. The game has three graphics quality modes as well. Similarly, the in-game music also pulls you in and sets a very engrossing tone for the game, adapting to the situation you are in. Even the occasional sound effects are pretty nicely done and the narration is good enough. It’s no Morgan Freeman, but still pretty cool.

The controls aren’t all that bad. Moving around your character is easy enough but we faced the most problem while rotating objects so that’s something which can be worked on. Aside from that, there isn’t much else to the controls but before you play the game, we recommend turning off the vibrations from the settings menu.

Another issue that slightly impacted gameplay was the viewing angles. It was pointed down at the character and puzzles but fixed in place so if you want to take a look at the elements out of the screen’s view, you can’t scroll around but have to move your character. Playing through, we didn’t come across any Ads or In-App Purchases which is pretty cool and adds to the environment which the game tries to create.


Final Verdict

The game succeeds at creating an immersive experience for players with the unique graphics and audio. The story is pretty good as well with a bunch of twists and turns while also being different from other games. However, the controls were where we faced most issues with the viewing angles and rotating objects. The game manages to play on the trope of a pen being mightier than a sword pretty well and the visuals are the highlight while the audio follows closely.

While the game came on PC earlier and we looked at some gameplay out of curiosity, it’s very different from the mobile version (except for the overall story, graphics, and audio) so it’s really great to see that the developers put in some more work to make it better for mobile devices. The puzzles which the game revolves around are pretty good and require you to pay attention to the elements and fit things where they belong. Overall, from our review perspective, Inked is a great play and something which we recommend but with a few changes, it can be better.


What are your opinions on the Inked game and your review of it? Do let us know in the comments!

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