Side-Scrolling Heaven

Just when you thought 2D platform gaming, you know, the stuff that you played as a little kid, thanks to great games like “Super Mario Bros,” “Mega Man,” and “Sonic the Hedgehog,” was dead, a great game like “Limbo” comes along that completely mesmerizes, thanks to solid graphics, sound and an abundance of style.

Currently available on the X-Box Live Arcade, “Limbo” may not be as long as you like, but it’s certainly unique, providing plenty of memorable moments along the way.

Feeling similar to another amazing 2D side-scroller on the Live Arcade, “Braid,” minus the fast forward and rewind function, “Limbo” is simple in its approach, as it’s all about avoiding obstacles and getting through rigorous environments. Using your surroundings to navigate through the terrain, “Limbo” forces you to use your brain at times, but most of the time the answers lie right on the screen, making the gameplay fun, yet intuitive, as the puzzles flow into one another incredibly well. You’d never think that climbing trees, flipping switches, pulling bear traps and jumping would be all that fun, but there’s an inescapable charm here; something magical is at work. Capturing the essence of classic 2D adventures, yet cool enough to keep your attention throughout, “Limbo” is a must-own on the 360, even if it can be beaten in less than six hours.

However, aside from perfect controls and great pick up and play gameplay, “Limbo” is probably memorable most for its non use of color. Yep, you guessed it, the game is completely in black and white. Feeling like a dream from Tim Burton, “Limbo” does a great job of providing terrific ambiance with the barest of essentials. Using beautiful graphical asides such as shadows, smoke, moving water and solid animations, combined with the perfect amount of sound effects, “Limbo” is video game art personified.

It doesn’t matter if the story is non-existent or your character’s most distinguishing features are his small white eyes either. Simply put, “Limbo” gives you a world that’s worth getting stuck in and is equally as satisfying to get out of. Even if it’s only a mere distraction in the bigger gist of video gaming, it’s an experience that you’ll remember for being as beautiful as it is different from everything else available on the system.

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About Patrick Hickey Jr. 14230 Articles
Patrick Hickey Jr. is a full-time Assistant Professor of Communication & Performing Arts and Director of the Journalism program at Kingsborough Community College and is the chairman of the City University of New York Journalism Council. He is the Founder and Editor-In-Chief of ReviewFix.com. He's also a former News Editor at NBC Local Integrated Media and National Video Games Writer at Examiner.com where his work was mentioned in National Ad campaigns by Disney, Nintendo and EA Sports. Hickey was also the Editor-In-Chief of two College Newspapers before he received his BA in Journalism from Brooklyn College. Hickey's work has been published in The New York Daily News, The New York Times, Complex, The Hockey Writers, Yahoo!, Broadway World, Examiner, NYSportScene Magazine, ProHockeyNews.com, GothamBaseball.com, The Syracuse Post-Standard, Scout.com and the official sites of the Brooklyn Aces and New York Islanders. His first book, The Minds Behind the Games: Interviews With Cult And Classic Video Game Developers was released in April 2018 and is chock full of interviews with legendary developers. His second book in the series, The Minds Behind Adventures Games, was released in December 2019. His third book, The Minds Behind Sports Games, was released in September 2020. His fourth book, The Minds Behind Shooter Games, was released in March 2021. The Minds Behind Sega Genesis Games and The Minds Behind PlayStation Games were released in 2022 and The Minds Behind PlayStation 2 was published in January 2023. Hickey is also a contracted comic book writer, currently penning his original series, "Condrey," as well as "The Job," "Brooklyn Bleeds" "Dem Gulls" and "KROOM" for Legacy Comix, where he serves as founder, owner and Editor-in-Chief. Hickey Jr. is also a voice actor, having starred in the 2018 indie hit and 2019 Switch, PS4 and Xbox One release, The Padre (also serving as English language Story Editor), from Shotgun With Glitters. The sequel, The Padre: One Shell Straight to Hell was released in February 2021- Hickey also served as a Story Editor and Lead Voiceover performer. He has also done narration and trailers for several other titles including The Kaiju Offensive, Relentless Rex and Roniu’s Tale. Hickey is also the lead voiceover performer on Mega Cat Studios’ upcoming title WrestleQuest, responsible for nearly 90 characters in the game, as well as Skybound's Renfield: Bring Your Own Blood, where he voices both Dracula and Renfield, as well as several other characters. He also stars in Ziggurat Interactive’s World Championship Boxing Manager 2, where he performs the VO of nearly every male character in the game. He also worked on the Atari VCS’s BPM Boy.

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