Puzzle games are hot. Professor Layton, Scribblenauts, World of Goo, even Bejeweled, they’re all making headlines, and rightly so. Puzzle games offer a way to escape from the normal world, where bosses, spouses, parents and others make life miserable, to a world where diabolical puzzles make your life miserable instead. But that’s about the only entertainment they offer. A puzzle book by Sam Loyd, no matter how entertaining, just isn’t the same as a novel by Jules Verne. Similarly, a puzzle game can’t replace the profound entertainment that’s offered by a traditional adventure game… or can it?
Enter Puzzle Bots. Puzzle Bots is an ambitious venture, in that it tries to marry two genres that, although related, at first glance appear not to have very much in common: (more…)
The Blackwell Convergence is the third installment of Wadjet Eye Games’ Blackwell franchise. For many, the wait has been even more of a killer than The Countess herself; originally slated for release in 2008, the July 2009 release of Convergence has had much to live up to. Delays usually lead to two main progessions of thought in a gamer’s mind: the game will either be of a lesser quality than before due to problems in development, or polished to a finer shine than was originaly expected. 
Blackwell Unbound is the second episode of the Blackwell franchise from Dave Gilbert’s Wadjet Eye Studios. It is an interesting game in many ways, in particular due to the decision to tell a story from the past, rather than continue directly on from The Blackwell Legacy. The ever-informative director’s commentary immediately sheds some light on this decision: 
The Blackwell Legacy is the first episode of Dave Gilbert’s The Blackwell Series, published by Wadjet Eye Games. It was actually originally released as Bestowers Of Eternity, created with the AGS engine and winning several awards in the process. Yet The Blackwell Legacy is more than a mere graphical update and the addition of voices to an old title. 
Emerald City Confidential succeeds first and foremost as an adventure because it tells a good story. I cannot emphasize even nearly enough how much this game has surprised me with its gripping narrative with a fresh take on the already well known Land of Oz and its inhabitants. 
