Monochroma Critic Reviews

I really enjoyed my time with Monochroma. I found it charming, intriguing and most importantly, very well done.

Clearly inspired by Limbo, Monochroma is an experience fans of the former will enjoy. There are some aspects that should have been polished, but it does deserve a try.

This atmospheric puzzler/platformer takes you to a 50s dystopia. Playing as a kid with a little brother puts boundaries on you to go wherever you want freely. Monochroma is a great first start for the studio, but brings nothing new to this genre.

Despite being clearly inspired by Limbo, Monochroma finds its own voice and uses it to say interesting things. Sadly, its level design lacks imagination and the mechanics are a bit rough, so you should consider buying it only if you really dig its style.

What Monochroma gets right, however, is tone and gameplay. The puzzle platforming is fun to solve once you get the feel for character movement, there’s a lot of variety in puzzle design, and some very clever level layout ties everything together.

Monochroma wants you to debate your every move, to drain you of color and splash you with hope when you play well. It’s often too quiet to know if you’re doing just that.

While obviously being influenced by games like Limbo, Monochroma has a flavor and story all its own. Monochroma is a good game at heart, but it's hidden under technical errors and gameplay flaws that gave me no end of frustration.

Another case of "would have been much better with more fine tuning". The botched controls and some bugs are annoying.

Monochroma is a good puzzle platformer with a remarkable artistic level, inspired by famous products such as ICO and Limbo, however, the game mechanics are sometimes affected by imprecise controls and a physics engine not always responsive. The social commitment of the developers is laudable.

It’s a great looking game. The look and feel is wonderful and moody, punctuated with flashes of red, such as a boy’s blowing scarf or a blooming flower found at the bottom of a well. And it’s great seeing games coming out of all corners of the world. But this only makes the experience all the more frustrating.

Despite some memorable imagery, Monochroma plays like a budget-price Limbo.

A Limbo-like game with good visuals and inspired puzzle design, ruined by frustrating controls, poor animations and some minor bugs.

Amidst all the other plateaued features the game has to offer, it’s not enough to maintain sufficient buzz or convince jaded gamers not to wait for a seasonal sale.

The arty crust hides a tasty platformer, that is unfortunately marred by perpetual darkness. The gloomy atmosphere rules everything.

Nowhere Studios have an artistic eye that spoke in a unique and moving way to me at first but the technical problems voided that emotional connection and Monochroma ended up being a slog rather than a joy.

Monochroma has the heart of a good dramatic game, but it has neither the soul nor mechanics of one.

To the question if Monochroma meets the high expectations raised from the Kickstarter campaign, the answer is no. However, despite the game's mediocrity, there are some glimpses of quality and since it's the studio's first attempt, there could be better results in the future.

It is more than obvious that Monochroma's inspiration is derived -mainly- from the excellent Limbo, presenting a rather interesting dystopian world. Unfortunately the large number of bugs, the unimaginative riddles and the inability to create any interest for the fate of the two brothers make this game utterly forgettable.

Monochroma is a flawed but beautiful game that has a few shining moments, but for the most part struggles with the two most important aspects of a puzzle platformer: the puzzles and the platforming.

In truth, it's an average game, with the music and the presentation proposing a more dramatic and meaningful experience than is actually manifested in the gameplay.