Oh man, where to start.
I'm going to spoiler whole lots of this, as I've played according to the leaderbaords in the game about 40% in. Don't worry if that seems like a lot and you won't catch up, it really isn't. It comes from about 2 and a half hours play of going in blind besides some quicklook thing I saw on I think Giant Bomb.
Onto the game. This might be out of sequential order, I've had a lot to think about typing this up and I'm not sure if everything is in periodic order. I've been hit with so much information it's hard to know what started where.
- Spoiler: show
- The game opens and you are treated to a light show at the top of Gomez's village. At first I thought it was speaking in pictures, but the letters appear to some sort of language we cannot understand. I didn't think much of it until I got the rotating ability and started exploring the houses collecting the cube until I noticed that the stuff taped up in the boiler room looks the same. I looked at it for a bit and couldn't tell what letters were which, so I left it at that. Actually, concerning that boiler room... It says there's a secret to it. I searched high and low and even managed to get outside the room and fall to my death. I couldn't find any secrets in there at all though. The room with the monocled gent in the painting also has a secret according to the map, I could find this neither.
Anyway, I carried on playing until I came to the room with the doors you need to have cubes to open further doors. I cannot remember which door I went through (I think there were two?), so I'm going to spoiler the next part.
- Spoiler: show
- So I'm noticing that these legends are all over the place, especially signs I try to deduce them. I'm looking at these signs I pass and noticing they have two legends on them. I figured they said up or something, but then I saw that the legends were different. My second guess is they were telling me what to press on the controller. I couldn't fathom out any particular pattern to these legends so just decided to make each room I went through golden.
It was about then I noticed a strange legend on the wall that I though was a secret I was looking for in a particular area, when I walked past it it started to glow, so I went through all the button presses on the pad seeing if I could activate it and claim my reward and it opened a door up and sent me to another area I'd already been to. They look like some sort of quick travel between places. I'm sure that's all they are, nothing important, although they'll come in handy when you need to get to places quite fast.
Playing a bit more I came across a bell...
- Spoiler: show
- Now I noticed it had legends on each side, but I also noticed that each side had a specific tone. I rang it in several different orders including the famous riff Big Ben plays. I didn't get anywhere though. I remembered that I'd claimed some treasure maps on the way to the bell and thought that some of them might have orders or legends which would correspond to the ones on the bell. It didn't. However, I theorise that those legends emblazoned on the bell are either numbers (0 through to 9) or they are the letters of the note the bell plays when it chimes (A through to G). I had a quick look of the maps while I was in this area and I couldn't place any of the areas depicted in them. They might as well be illegible to me right at this minute, I'm looking and racking my brain trying to figure out what the hell they are refering to, but I'm pulling a blank.
A bit further into my exploration I came across a blue door...
- Spoiler: show
- When I went through it i was given a puzzle to work out using blocks that i had to stack to make tetris shaped pieces (which look like the legends I've seen all over the game so far). I put them in some sort of order. I was turning the camera trying to figure out how to solve the puzzle when an achievement popped open and I was given a Anti-cube. I didn't even know these things existed until this moment. I thought I'd solved the puzzle, but on observing the map later I found that I had not. Anyway, later on I came back to this area and solved the puzzle right away, it seemed so bloody obvious after rotating the field loads of times.
Solution to last puzzle in next spoiler.
- Spoiler: show
- if you stack a pile two high and rotate it until you finally find the stack that matches the legends on the bottom, you've almost beat the puzzle. After that it's just a case of putting the other block in one side and then rotating fully until it stays sat in the designated zones. If you struggle to get this right, just pick it up and move the camera and try again. Really simple once you've figured it out.
I went through areas clearing out the rooms according to the map and came across another blue door...
- Spoiler: show
- This one I couldn't for the fuck of me work out. It's like a pyramid that's underwater, with one side cut away. When you drop into the water on the side that's cut away it makes a noise that's very specific to being in the water at that point, but I just couldn't figure out how to push it any further. I came back a few times to this area and sometimes I had the black hole stuff floating about in the tree above. I don't think that has anything to do with it though. I tried to see if there was any other things I could exploit while i was on that island but couldn't find a way in.
At this point I'm noticing more of those teleport legends about, although they don't take me between the two areas the others did. There's some other teleport thing and a teleport cube. I've no idea what the hell they are for really, although I'm guessing further into the game they'll make it easier to jump between bigger portions of the map.
I came across a blue door...
(warning solution)
- Spoiler: show
- That I solved almost instantly. Each cube was engraved and each side of the cube had engravings on that you had to throw them into. Really basic stuff.
I went about and polished some fragments of cubes off, for the most getting the cubes has been really straight forward. I had enough cubes to open all but the final door when I stopped playing, and I've not been into those doors opened by the cubes yet. It's bugging me and my mind is racing as to what what is in front of me with this game.
I'm really enjoying it so far. I hope it doesn't get as complex as Braid did, I didn't really understand how I completed some of those puzzles and eventually my mind broke and was unable to comprehend what the fuck was going on in the latter end of the game. I can't understand the complexity and beauty of some well crafted puzzles when they are way above my head.
I hope I didn't spoil too much in the bits I've not spoilered new players. If I'm going to far just say.
