After finding that Antler Studios released a free demo for Project Grove, a unique puzzle-platform game set in a semi-open steampunk world, I had to give it a shot. My first run through proved to have a few bugs that needed to be fixed, but it didn’t take long after I notified the team that they went in and got the demo updated. So now that they showed dedication to the game’s improvement and trying the improved demo, I am ready to share some initial thoughts.
Before I get into the first impression, they are on the final hours of their Kickstarter and are roughly 70% funded. If there is a day to push a game worth funding to a successful crowdfunding campaign, today is that today!
Gameplay
You start out in your home and science center where you are studying the strange world below your floating rock. This gives you time to get a small test run of the basic controls as you make your way to the lift that will take you to the bottom, as well as bring you back up later. Through these initial moments of the game you can take in the environment around you, hear the first bit of the lore through radio messages, and meet your mechanical sidekick L-P1N.
They do a good job with a tutorial beginning as it gives you step-by-step instructions on where to go and what you need to do. This is when you first learn how to use L-P1N as a platform to aid you up higher terrain and how to self-navigate the terrain as well. There are some collectible items along the way as well, such as rocks and plants, so be sure to observe your surroundings a bit.
It’s not until you reach the caves that you come across your first series of puzzles. I found this section partially impressive due to the way they blend the puzzles into the platforming aspects as well. You will have to think a little outside the box to get through this section and it is a good precursor to what they could do with a full-sized title.
Overall, I would say that the mechanics run pretty smoothly whether you are on land, swimming, or traversing the platforming areas.
Expectations
Much larger areas to traverse through with more puzzles and platforms to challenge our progress further. This area shows what I imagine to only be a small section of what they can bring with a full-scaled experience like this.
The trailers showed that there will be extra platformer-based elements added to the game and I look forward to seeing the ones they didn’t show in action as well as the ones we didn’t get to use yet. There is a lot of ambition shown with this game and it doesn’t seem to want to reach too far out of the scope of possibility.
Gradually increasing puzzle difficulty as we progress. Some of the puzzles had me for a second before I figured it out and I hope to see these puzzles get harder the further into the game you get.
Conclusion
Project Grove is off to a strong start! I am hoping that they end up funded in full so that we can see what the team can do with this concept. There is plenty of room for this game to grow and I have no doubt that it will be a title that fans of puzzle and platform games will enjoy playing once completed.
