This reminds us of the classics of 8 and 16 bits, and it is still commendable to see it in a current game at a time when developers hardly dare to let go of the hand.
Puzzles in a platform game
As soon as you like platform and puzzle games, you have to give Teslagrad a good chance. It’s a game well done, smart and fun, who knows how to capture users from the first moment and put their intelligence and command ability to the test in a very honest way. All this, wrapped in a very careful aesthetic and with a very good design of both levels and progression.
There is something that catches you in Teslagrad as soon as you enter its universe, because it is not the typical Metroidvania and also because it knows how to play very well with the elements of its environment, without having to resort to dialogue.
This total absence of text makes us have to discover what is hidden behind his story so much with what we are seeing how (especially) those fragments that are scattered throughout his world and that will be vital, in the end, to be able to see the good ending after defeating your last boss.
But, What is peculiar about it beyond its narrative proposal? That mix of platforms and puzzles, with less action than others of its kind. Play, how could it be otherwise, seeing what it is called, with everything that surrounds the electromagnetism of the elements and the figure of Nikola Tesla.
Difficult in its fair measure
The difficulty designed in the levels makes the tutorials expendable applies to the difficulty curve. An accessible start gives rise to increasingly far-fetched moments, but everything always within logic and without resorting to incomprehensible puzzles. In addition, thanks to the enhancers we mentioned we have a great sense of progress.
It is a game that presents us with the minimum necessary to advance by embodying the figure of a child who gets into a mess with three pairs of noses. Far from your home, inside the Tesla Tower, you will discover the old Teslamante technology, thanks to which you can begin to manipulate in a basic way the magnets that populate its almost one hundred rooms trying not to die.
Taking into account that opposite poles attract each other and those with the same magnetic field repel each other, we will have to play with these magnets to be able to circumvent different areas with traps, reach higher parts or even take advantage of the enemies that we will see. All in a very primitive way.
Highly addictive gameplay
Logically, the game will get more complicated and will gain in depth as we progress, since the child will get a few more powers with which they can play in different ways with the electromagnetic fields. Saving the distances, he will be able to “fly” or even attack with his staff in a quite practical and necessary way against the final boss. But it is that he also enjoys almost from the beginning with a most effective teleportation that would end up being rescued in World to the west, second work by Rain Games.
Not everything is perfect, yes: this narrative minimalism makes us miss a menu with more information, where we can only consult in a very limited way the map and the different hidden scrolls, which will show us the most cryptic vignettes about its legendary history.
In general, both the characters and the backgrounds are very successful, and the backgrounds sometimes steal our attention with some great designs. We also find the animations worthy of note, very careful and with many small details such as the faces of our protagonist when making an effort to climb or punch. We think this conveys the love that went into creating Teslagrad, and obviously, it is something that always speaks well of a game.
Nothing really negative, because Teslagrad has a very well studied mapping that will make us rack our brains and arm ourselves with patience until we get all those scrolls. And it will cost yours, in part because anything kills us with one touch. Thank you, at least, that you won’t have to worry about deaths, as if you were a Super Meat Boy.
