[Linked Image]


Another in the Black Cube series of games by Simon Mesnard, based on about an hour of play if the others were to your liking this should be too.

The game casts you as an astronaut, tasked with a mission by the Terran Space Pirates to find one of their members, who is both missing and also your friend. She was looking for the Black Cube, an alien artefact with various powers. The Kunci stargate teleports you to the last presumed location of your friend and having regained consciousness you find yourself exploring an old space station.

I feel compelled to say upfront that the game won't win any visual prizes (and this one seems even less likely than others but perhaps I am remembering wrong). It's rudimentary to say the least. However, the attraction of these games isn't the visuals or the soundtrack or the unfolding story, rather it's about the puzzling. You need to look for things here and piece them together to use there. They generally aren't easy, and this is no exception.

I am about 90 minutes of playtime in but in a straight line I reckon I have progressed about 15 minutes. I might be doing myself a disservice - I have activated what seems to be an important piece of machinery - but I also spent the bulk of that time trying to get the machine to work. I wasn't sure I had understood the puzzle, then was convinced I had, then wasn't sure I was inputting the relevant information correctly, then went off and reviewed and came back and tried all over again. And again. I do like those sorts of conundrums.

I have found a few pass codes, collected a few diary logs, and am currently scavenging stuff from a vehicle.

I do have to mention that the game locked up here and I was forced to exit. That you can save at will (and I had) was a blessing.

Zly.ii plays in the first person and is point and click except for the need to enter codes by use of the keyboard. Your mouse in the shape of a hand is fixed at the centre of the screen and the game pivots around it. Move the mouse about to find a hotspot (often that will be 'walk') and click to engage. Right click brings up the inventory and frees the mouse from its fixed position to enable you to access the items.

There is no spoken word, everything you learn being read. An AI interface 'speaks' to you in the same way.


Once again, weeds are my life!