Some horror games attempt to dazzle you with graphical intensity and multi layered soundtracks and as such come across like your Hollywood blockbuster movie. They’re full of loud noises and enemies bigger than skyscrapers. Limbo rejects that idea, it doesn’t want force ideas onto you. Instead of your big screen extravaganza, Limbo is a ghost story told around the campfire. It’s designed to be unsettling rather than outright scary.
If games are all about story then Limbo strips it right back to the basics, you play a small boy trying to find his sister. This isn’t set up in some elaborate cut scene and it remains the only piece of information you’re given about why you’re wandering this desolate landscape that has been seemingly drained of all colour. The black and white contrast on Limbo’s art style means that there’s plenty of dark corners for nightmarish things to hide in. The screen fades in and out casting shadows over what lies ahead. There’s a constant feeling of being on edge whilst playing Limbo, a complete sense of dread. Limbo will be taken apart and put back together by those who will want to finds out its secrets. There are already plenty of theories about what the game is actually about available to read online and this can only be a good thing. Limbo has depth that many other games of its size lack and it’ll live longer in the memory as a result.
This isn’t to say that Limbo doesn’t have a sense of humour about itself, in fact some of the funniest moments during game play are when the boy meets a grizzly demise. Heads roll, flesh is burnt from his bones and his arms flail whilst drowning but you’ll raise a slight smile every time it happens. Key to you appreciating these jokes is the fact that Limbo is extremely generous with restart points, often placing you right next to where you died in most circumstances. Limbo’s developers could have made you do it the hard way and forced you to start from further back but, if they’re going to make a joke out of death, then it’s probably a good idea for them to have the joke with you rather than at you. Something that could have been frustrating in the extreme is instead a catalyst for that ‘one more go’ feeling.
Death is something you’ll get used to both seeing and experiencing in Limbo. It might be eaten by a giant spider, sliced by a buzz saw or mangled by a bear trap but meeting your maker is just around the corner in Limbo. There is a definite element of trial and error as you approach each puzzle along the way and sometimes getting through each set piece is a mixture of skill and problem solving. At no point does Limbo feel like it’s conspiring against you.
There’s hardly any soundtrack to Limbo either, at least not in the traditional sense of having a layer of music over the top. Limbo’s sound is much more ambient than that with only the occasional scraping of steel to be heard. It’s effective though and another tool in the game’s arsenal of tools designed to freak you out at a moment’s notice. It’s very strange at first to not hear anything as the first stages kick in but it’s something you’ll get used to and it’s something you’ll relish later.
Xbox Live Arcade games and other downloadable content are often given a bad press for somehow being throwaway and not as much of an experience as something disc based. Limbo, whilst short at around 4 hours, shows up that idea by being good at what it has at it’s disposal. Limbo isn’t trying to deafen you with a hard rock soundtrack and nor is it encouraging you to have millisecond reactions in order to be good at it. It’s just wants you to enjoy it for what it is, a game that let’s you enjoy the darkness.
