Ian Buck: Antichamber Review

Note: this blog has been migrated to Medium, with the articles here available to preserve permalinks Please see this post at https://medium.com/@ianrbuck/antichamber-review-7d3e70b0dfbc

Antichamber is a thoroughly mind-melting first-person puzzle game that utilizes non-euclidian geometry as most of the puzzle elements. Now there's a sentence that doesn't apply to most games.

The visuals are very simple; the hallways are mostly white, with only black lines to indicate where corners are. Colors are very important in this game; they can help you orient yourself as the world changes around you (did I mention that you can be walking down a hallway, get to the end, turn around, and see a completely different hallway behind you?). The color of your gun also determines what its powers are. There are several sections of the game, each requiring a different gun to solve its puzzles.

Speaking of puzzles, they are a doozy. Because the game does not rely on traditional notions of geometry, they can really do whatever they want. I don't want to spoil any of the puzzles, but don't feel discouraged if you can't solve one the first time you try. Sometimes there is a tool or technique that you have to get in a different chamber first. And even if you get completely stuck, you can just hit Esc at any time and go to the Antichamber.

The antichamber serves as a main menu. The game's options and controls are all plastered over one wall, a map of all of the chambers you have been to (you can travel to any one of them from the antichamber) a view of what claims to be the exit, and a big chalkboard of the lessons you have learned.

Those lessons are my favorite thing about the game. They are often placed just before or after a puzzle, and they contain a life lesson that pertains to that particular puzzle.

Eerily, my 21st birthday is coming up.

I've played about three hours of the game, and I have discovered two different colors of the gun, and I think there are two more. I'm kind of stuck though, and I might have to bite the bullet and look at some walkthroughs.