2 Hour Review: Braid

I just played through the second (or 3rd World) of Braid, a new game on Xbox Live's arcade. I had heard of this platforming, time shifting game and even seen videos of it. But after 5 minutes playing the demo, I happily paid over 1200 Microsoft Points ($15) for the full version and downloaded it post-haste.

Braid is a beautifully drawn platforming game with a few intricate twists thrown in based off of time-shifting mechanics. Accidentally fall off of a platform and die? No problem. Hit the X button and you reverse time. Sounds simple. But later you get abilities to rewind time and not yourself or items in the world and you have a really good basis for a puzzle platform game. And some time shifting is controlled by your movement.

Pictures and video will do wonders to explain what's going on in this really awesome game. Here is an interview with Jonathan Blow about why he created a simple platforming game and his thoughts behind it.