Inside is Off to a Fabulous Start
Inside is making some waves with some killer review scores. The puzzle platformer adventure game developed by Playdead is currently averaging a 91 on Metacritic. That is with over 40 reviews in. There is no question that is an impressive meta-average. It makes Inside the highest rated Xbox One game so far this year and the 3rd highest Xbox One game of all time. To say that Inside is looking like a must play for Xbox fans is an understatement.
Game Informer scored the game a 98 and reported the following:
“Inside has excellent gameplay, thoughtful puzzles, and deadly obstacles that are entertaining to avoid – but it feels wrong to call the game “fun.” The full experience, from its opening moments to a finale that left my mouth agape, is a strangely uncomfortable one. The world’s implied history immediately pulled me in, and it’s an experience I can’t put out of my head. My chest tightens as I recall the feeling of entering new areas, succumbing to surprise deaths and witnessing its many unexpected moments. By the end, I felt as though I had lived through someone’s horrible dream, and I couldn’t wait to do it all over again.”
Giant Bomb gave Inside a perfect score and said this:
“It feels strange to talk so little in specific about a game I’m so impressed by, and I could write a review three times as long citing examples like the first time you put on that… ah, forget it. This is less a nod to overly sensitive spoiler culture and more an acknowledgement of Inside as a work of singular creativity and meticulous design, one of those games where the more it surprises you, the more it’ll impress you. I have a hard time coming up with much, other than a conclusion that left me wanting a little more, that this game could do better. It’s that question of the gap between ambition and fulfillment, a gap which here is all but nonexistent. Looking at and playing Inside gives the feeling that every surface, every animation, every light and pixel were placed and replaced until they all fit together just right. You see where the six years went. I can’t even picture what kind of game Playdead could make another six years from now.”
Inside is Playdead’s second title following their critically-praised 2010 Limbo. The game is thematically and visually similar to Limbo, where the player controls a young boy in an eerie, nearly monochromatic landscape, solving environmental puzzles while avoiding the death of the character.
Inside was released on Xbox One June 29, 2016, and will be released on Microsoft Windows on July 7, 2016.