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POSTED
29/3/14
FEZ
Polytron
PS4/PSN + PS3/PSN + Vita/PSN (also on Xbox 360/XBLA, PC)
Hey, nice hat! Often an opportunity to revisit a game that you’ve
not played for some time can result in a different opinion from that
which you formed on your first date. This value-bulging crossbuy
release of Fez, which lands you PS4, PS3 and Vita
incarnations all for one pocket money price, is no exception. We
actually think that, despite its often obtuse fiendishness, we
undermarked this absolute delight with a mere 8.5. Take from that
what you will...
Candy! Sweet, sweet candy! Whassat? It’s an ‘F’? Oh, puck.
So, no lolly pellet-stuffed flip-top heads, rather a red Moroccan
headular adornment with magical powers. You see, little blocky Gomez
was happy trip-tropping about his resolutely 2D world. But then
along came a cube – a completely impossible construct to a world so
flat - that bestowed upon him said hat, fucking-up his world just like that.
We worship the super-brilliant C64 game Nebulus, a platformer
that span the world around on its axis as you walked/jumped through
or around towers. Fez channels it, but in a more cube top,
squared-off, eight corners, 90 degree angles kinda way that has you
sitting and rotating. A bit, erm – lot - like
Crush 3D.
So, with your pixel puppet Gomez you traipse around various 16-bitty
universes, chatting to natives, breaking and entering, disinterring
obtuse puzzles and accumulating treasure and golden cubic
objecticles. The more you gather, the more places become
visitational from a purple-dicular hub world.
The best bit – although not necessarily for everybody - is that it’s
all physically non-confrontational. No fighting, nobody trying to
kill you except you yourself. Then, when you do make little G-man go
‘splut!’ now, he just rematerialises at his last safe spot.
Progression unearths weird glyphs, plus an apparent surfeit of
leftovers from a Tetris
explosion. Far from decorationary stuff, these are usually fiendish
– and we mean that, possibly indicating how dumb we are - puzzles.
Decipher, push this way and that, ring bells, find warps, go
collecty on anti-cubes... Fez ain’t no casual walk in the
Block Forest.
Despite real glitches – others, like an early reboot, are quite
obviously intentional - Fez beguiles then staples itself to
your bonce like a brain slug, but with red hatacular flair, rather
than green and slimular bleah.
Damn, where’d we put that garlic shampoo?
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