Remember when video games had demos? What happened to that? How do we know if we like a game before we spend huge amounts of pocket money? Are developers ashamed of their creations, or are there darker forces at play?

Preamble

Thankfully there are still demos available, albeit mainly from indie developers. But in most cases indie games are the best anyway.

This brings us to Gorogoa, a fantabulous-looking forthcoming puzzle game by Jason Roberts.

Set to be published by Annapurna Pictures in “Spring 2017”, Gorogoa has been in development for a few years.

I played the demo back in 2013 and planned to review it upon release. But impatience has got the better of me, so I will review the demo instead.

Review

As you can see from the big eye in the picture above, this is hand drawn beauty of a game. Roberts has said that he spent much development time simply improving his drawing skills. As a man who has never taken the proper time to learn to draw, I have the deepest respect. Here’s a screenshot of the main game.

This is a quiet, thoughtful demo. We are given four windowpanes. Each is filled with a carefully drawn image. Some are obviously connected, part of the same scene. The challenge is to find the more abstract connections.

The panes can be dragged and dropped—moved around to different squares. Most times this will just swap the position of the drawings. But you will notice that some of them have cutout shapes. If you match the cutouts with parts of another drawing, the scene changes like some kind of four-dimensional alternative universe. The panes become animated and the action moves gently along.

In terms of “ahhh!” moments, this game is made of them.

There is little else to say apart from the fact that Journey composer Austin Wintory is now on board to score the full game. That is reason enough to be excited!

I wish Gorogoa all the best. If the award-winning demo (Windows/Mac) is anything to go by, this will be a game of legend.

Here is a very slightly spoilery trailer that explains everything:

Thank you for your time.

Gorogoa is set to be released imminently on desktop and mobile.