Spent an evening there getting destroyed repeatedly before finally working out the upgrade thingy… maybe that’ll help?  Probably not…

I tried.

You need to get on the Golden Path my friend.

After a strong start I'm starting to get a bit rough with the covids. This is either the perfect game to play while sick or it'll always be the fever game in my head.

Finished it last night. No shame in admitting I used the “no fail” mode cos I didn’t enjoy the combat by the end at all. Makes Elden Ring look like a cakewalk.

What I was in it for was the absolutely stellar puzzle at the core of the game. Sitting down and working it out with pen and paper was genuinely brilliant, as were all the little puzzles surrounding it – proper The Witness vibes going on and very satisfying to solve. Loads of stuff i’m still not sure on though, something like… 10 secrets of one type left and 9 of another.

Actually I was pleased with myself after running the

Also enjoying watching people on reddit chip away at the “meta puzzle” too

I'm really enjoying this.  I'm sure I'm still VERY early in the game but as I now have I can attempt

This is almost certainly going to be my goty.  It’s ace.

Tempy wrote:

Also enjoying watching people on reddit chip away at the “meta puzzle” too

A non spoilery review, where I sound harsher that I meant to:


A beautiful patchwork quilt of inspirations that weaves its threads together with consummate skill, then drapes itself over a blow up mattress. 

This is without question one of my favourite experiences of the past decade, but the extreme difficulty doesn't suit the feel of the game.  The mechanics aren't awful by a long shot, but they're a considerable distance away from the majesty of the adventure.  I'm an advocate of assist modes, but I've never felt the need to implore anyone to reach for them immediately.  However, playing this as intended feels like listening to [insert your own masterpiece, I'm not foolish enough to leave myself open to scoffing by typing 'Blood on the Tracks'] with earmuffs on.  I should thank @Tempy for the inspiration to toggle the no fail setting for the final boss (YMMV), but in hindsight I wish I'd swallowed my pride for each of the main guardians.  Too many c***s spoil the broth, so to speak.  I love banging my head against a good boss, unfortunately none of Tunic's bigger baddies tick all the required boxes and the frankly rotten nastiness of the major encounters highlight the slight control deficiencies.  They're doable with a ton of practice (as stated, the controls aren't bad per se), but in practice neither the patterns or the methods are much fun.  The devs had more faith in the strength of the combat than it deserves, and the difficulty is almost humorously outrageous at times.  Having said that, the standard stages felt like they were pitched just right, so it's only the bosses I had an issue with.

With that out the way, the entirety of the rest of the Tunic experience is bona fide, once per generation masterpiece stuff.  If the bosses threaten to shake you off, don't let them.  If you still don't fancy playing this, watch someone else play it and experience the wonder vicariously.  I've been trying to think of an analogy for the layers a while, as a lowly onion won't suffice.  It's more like a map in a bottle, written on rose petals in invisible ink behind a magic eye picture of yourself picking up a map in a bottle.  The pixie dusting that covers the whole thing is intoxicating.  I devoured it in a few days, assisted by almost full banishment to the loft room at home as I'm riddled with covid.  I mentioned this elsewhere but this will forever be tied with feverishness for me.  I'm on the mend now, but yesterday was a rough one, NGL, and I did most of my mopping up in a weird trancelike state between naps with a splitting headache.  Which bizarrely suited it perfectly.  

With better judgement of its difficulty (or better yet, an improved combat system) this could have been a [10].  The drip feeding of the instruction manual - and the pages themselves - might be the greatest thing in the history of adventure games.  At the very least it's on par with insult sword fighting. So much better than I thought it would be, and I've been on the hook since the reveal. [9]

P.S: Wasn't sure where to put this, but it's weird how much Death's Door feels like an abridged version of Tunic, or at least the surface level of it.  If a film was made lifting the lid on the development process of DD it wouldn't surprise me if it started with a spying mission, Biesla style, followed by a mad dash to get out the gates first.

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Moot_Geeza wrote:

Tempy wrote:

Also enjoying watching people on reddit chip away at the “meta puzzle” too

Spoiler:

The golden path to open the mountain door, or are there even deeper mysteries?

Oh, there are much, much, much deeper things. I opened that door myself. Am proud of my skills.

I worked that bit out all myself but used a guide for