Manifold Garden is by far one of the most beautiful games I’ve played in a long time. Its scenery and use of its Escher-esque stylings are some of the best I’ve ever seen. The music paired while exploring the mind-twisting non-Euclidean physics promotes the feeling of awe as you are enveloped by the grand scale of the world around you.
The game creates the feeling of a seamless puzzle experience. It has the feeling of always moving forward. While there are a few instructions in the introduction, the game really doesn’t hold your hand. It also really doesn’t need to. The design of the levels provides a feeling of always progressing which is nice to find in a first-person puzzle game.
The goal of the game is to plant and grow trees in the manifold garden. The trees clear out the corruption that is plaguing the world. The trees are planted by God cubes, that are freed by solving the puzzles of each level. The puzzles consist of using blocks to place into locks that open the next section, the world being as is encourages thinking outside the box to figure out how to achieve the goal. Sometimes requiring falling into the duplication of the map that is repeated forever, using the cubes to change the direction of water, or even shifting gravity to cause the map to move giant platforms into place.
I would recommend Manifold Garden for anyone who likes games that have alternative physics. I personally was underwhelmed by the puzzle aspect of this game; however, it is made up for with the stunning visuals. The game is pretty short, about 6 hours, but every minute is filled with beauty. For 19.99 USD it’s hard to say a game this short is worth the cost, however, In my opinion, it’s worth the price for the experience.
Manifold garden can be found on most platforms.
Steam. Epic. Apple. Playstation. Nintendo. Xbox. Itch.io.
