Trine Review

Score: 85 / 100
Good: Very interesting story line with amazing support, including in game narration and music that complements the mood. Three characters in one which gives an interesting angle on game play and puzzle solving.
Bad: Puzzles could be more challenging. Rotating objects with the wizard is very clunky and frustrating. Enemies are easily defeated.
Reviewed On: PC

Trine is an adventure / puzzle side-scroller that brings an interesting spin to the genre. Unlike most side scrollers where you play as one character, you have the option to become any one of three characters at any given point in time by the push of a button.

Each character offers their own special abilities to help you solve puzzles and find your way towards the source of evil. Why would you be compelled to move towards the source of evil? To destroy it of course… as well as to free each of these three poor souls from being stuck together for eternity.

“Whoa!” you might be thinking, so let me slow down and explain a bit. The story begins with a kingdom being taken over by the waking undead, as is to be expected. While this is happening, three different people, a wizard, a thief, and a knight are heading towards the same place all for their own reasons. The thief wishes to steal some precious artifact and naturally arrives first. She touches the artifact and becomes frozen. Next, a wizard happens upon this scene and low and behold touches the artifact himself. Last but not least, the knight arrives and does the same.

Through a stroke of luck for you the player, this artifact happens to bind three souls together until they can be released through the combining of a few other artifacts. So this is how you get the opportunity to control three characters in one.

Each of these characters have their own unique ability(s) to bring to the table, and each of these ability(s) can be used in combination to help you advance through the game. All of these abilities can be enhanced or upgraded throughout the game as you gain experience.

The wizard has the ability to summon different objects and is able to levitate/move objects around with a wave of his glowing hand. Initially, he can only summon a box, he can however learn to summon a bridge and a floating platform. Each of these can then be upgraded to summon multiple boxes, bridges, etc. The thief is handy with her bow and can use a grappling hook to catch on to certain objects in the level and swing around. Later on her bow can be upgraded to fire more arrows, shoot flame arrows, and decrease the time it takes for her to prep an arrow for firing. The knight has a shield he can block with and of course his sword for close encounters. He can upgrade the damage of his sword, get a knock down ability that is useful against enemies with shields, and finally can get a lightning hammer that pretty much dominates anything in its path.

Throughout the game you are required to use each individual’s characters skills at least once. If you wish to prove your bad assery and do it with one or two characters, be my guest, but most will find it easier to use all three. The game provides many different puzzles that can be solved through the use of the characters abilities. Whether it be using the wizard to summon bridges to walk across a ravine, or quickly grappling onto a nearby tree limb to swing over said ravine with the thief.

Some areas require you to use skills in tandem, especially later on in the game. Many will find it useful to summon the floating platforms and having the thief use it as a point to swing from with her grapple. Many other combinations of skills can be used together which keeps the game fun and interesting. You’ll find yourself quickly switching between characters often to survive as well as to advance within the game.

Overall, Trine provides a fun story telling experience, as well as a challenge to find your way through the levels. While not many of these puzzles completely stumped me, they were definitely fun to solve. The whole experience of being given the choice of any character and their skills at any time through the game was unique and awesome. I enjoyed being able to fire an arrow and quickly switch to the knight to block an incoming arrow being fired back at me.

Once you get in the zone you’ll find the game play flows very nicely and controls very easily, so that quick switch from one character to the other might be the difference between living and dying, will come naturally. Once again, I love the flow, the game play is fun, and I think anyone that picks up this game will enjoy it. Be prepared though, it might seem a little short. I would say it took me maybe about 6 hours to beat.

- Jordan Hoven (Lazer32)

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