Fractal, or Fractal: Make Blooms Not War, is the newest indie game to hit the scene. This time we're dealing with a puzzle game and in terms of being puzzling and immersive, it does its job in spades.
Making blooms of hexagons is the name of the game, and although some of the gameplay ends up feeling a tad random and out of our control, the smooth audiovisual presentation and quick pace help keep things moving.
The play field is a simple looking emulation of a flowerbed, with a few scattered hexagonal buds. Instead of directly moving these buds, you're given the choice of pushing them along a certain direction. Thing is, this movement acts a lot like a wind current, so whenever you blow the wind, any other cubes in the vicinity of its range will move as well. When the blocks make contact and a flower is build, a combo starts, more buds move in and so the game continues. You're given a limited number of blocks to play with and an overall score to beat. Clang that score and you're golden and move on to the next level.
The aforementioned random nature of the game comes from how blocks come in and the overall shape of the playing field. Sometimes combos come in way too easily, simply as soon as new blocks are placed. In earlier levels, where there's only one block color to worry about, this randomness becomes apparent, but thanks to the quick pace of beating levels and moving on, you're quickly taken to harder stages that not only add extra bud colors, but also a changing color influence your wind can have
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At that point, Fractal turns into a much more strategic game and starts to rise above a simple concept turned into a cheaper gaming alternative, like a lot of indie downloads tend to fall into. This is even more evident when you jump out of the campaign mode and start poking around the extra modes, where new elements and alternative objectives are introduced. In one of the special stages, you're pushed forward by a strict time limit while having unlimited blocks to deal with, while challenge mode gives you specific objectives such as triggering an specific number of flowers or reaching a certain combo before time expires.Fractal is one of the best indie puzzle games out at the moment. Even though it started out a little too easy for my taste, it quickly kicked me into high gear and kept me interested past the campaign mode with some clever extra modes that could have easily been made into separate games by themselves. |8
