The Talos Principle

This was such a gem, probably the best puzzle game I've ever played. I'm glad I finally got around to it. The puzzles in the Talos Principle were wonderful. It deserves praise alone for how well it communicates different mechanics wordlessly At first, I thought some puzzles introduced mechanics like being able to put boxes on drones a little poorly, but after taking the game's advice and moving to another, I often found that the latter was the dedicated "tutorial puzzle." I appreciated how those ones rarely felt like a significant difficulty drop or pacebreaker, the introductions felt natural. The storyline was very compelling. Compared to other games where participation in the narrative is optional, I found many of the log entries and files interesting and brief enough to not mind their intrusion Despite the game already being over a decade old, I found it to be aesthetically very pleasing. Even in a single world, the locations were varied and oftentimes beautiful to look at. It has an excellent atmosphere for a puzzle game,[spoiler]outside of the final portion of the tower climb, where there is a soft time limit and a sense of urgency as you go against the narrator's wishes,[/spoiler]the lovely vistas and music create a very calm and relaxed atmosphere that give you space to focus. My one and only big issue was that despite the native linux build of the game generally running wonderfully, it repeatedly crashed in a certain later location ([spoiler]world A's messenger area[/spoiler]), forcing me to switch to the Windows build.