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Generally favorable reviews - based on 47 Critics What's this?

User Score

Generally favorable reviews- based on 281 Ratings

  • Summary: Machinarium is independent puzzle / adventure game developed by the makers of popular web-games Samorost and Samorost2. A little robot who’s been thrown out to the scrap yard behind the city must return and confront the Black Cap Brotherhood and save his robot-girl friend.
Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 43 out of 47
  2. Negative: 0 out of 47
  1. One of the most beautiful games to hit home computers in a long time.
  2. 100
    Aside from the lameness of the tutorial minigame and the occasional obtuse puzzle, this is indie gold. A fantastic, rewarding, deeply satisfying adventure with one of the most beautiful game worlds you'll see this side of a team Ico game; it's a rare must-play.
  3. Machinarium is an old-school Adventure, and a must-buy for hardcore fans of the point and click genre.
  4. Gloriously beautiful, infuriatingly fiddly. [Christmas 2009, p.98]

See all 47 Critic Reviews

Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 57 out of 64
  2. Negative: 5 out of 64
  1. SiL
    9
    A wonderful game. Wom Bat's score is unfair. Flash began it's life as an interactive animation engine. This game is therefore well suited to Flash. And you know that if your PC can load Flash, you can play this game. No crazy system requirements! Plus it's multiplatform. It's inexpensive, lovingly crafted and nicely balanced. You can try a demo on the creator's website, and if you enjoy it, buy and play immediately. It's a pleasure to give a small sum of money directly to those who spent so many hours to deliver such a beautiful experience. Games like this will change the world. With all the hating on our medium, having just one newspaper editor play this in their spare time might change the way they report on games - this is art pure and simple. Collapse
  2. CallumS
    8
    A very beautiful game that takes me back to my childhood playing monkey island and full throttle. The puzzles are not that difficult as you are only allowed to move within small areas so items and objectives are easy to see. I was trying too hard with some puzzles as more information was given than needed to complete them. Also most of the puzzles are very similar, in that you look at a control panel on the wall and have to move lights/beads from a to b in a certain way. The main gripe would be the control system, you're only allowed to interact with items that are close to you. Being used to other game controls I constantly tried to click objects with inventory items half way across the screen and nothing happening. This resulted in me trying to right click to place the item back into inventory but this brings up the flash menu and slows the game down for a few seconds (a limitation with flash however). So then you have to move you cursor to the top of the screen place the item back, walk over to the object, get the item out again and then use it. I just can Expand
  3. killswitch1968
    7
    Machinarium is a competent adventure game that does a lot of things right. The art work is gorgeous and the storyline, while simple, is delivered completely without dialogue in a wholly endearing manner. The sounds and awkward movements from the in-game robots are fantastic. The puzzles themselves are somewhat hit and miss. Many people have said this game is too hard, but for most adventure game vets there will probably only be a couple areas that you will struggle. My biggest gripe with the game are how so many of the puzzles are little more than mini-games a la Chinese puzzles. There are at least 10 puzzles that look like flash games you'd on the internet. They don't mesh with the story, and exist in their own little vacuum. The number of well done in-game puzzles because substantially less after taking this into account. The interface is another issue. The game is written completely in flash. You won't be able to use an item or interact with the environment unless you are standing right next to the object in question. That is, you won't get a cursor indicator letting you know that the object is interactable. This creates a huge problem where you swear you had tried to perform the correct action but you couldn't work with the interface to accomplish said task. All in all, for an independent game it is extremely well done. It installs very easily with no DRM, and all the files in-game are 1s and 0s, even the extensions! Other than some deficiencies in gameplay, it is indeed a triumph. Expand
  4. This game is a souped up Flash game. It is cute and the music is suitable and fun at times. However I feel I'm often reduced to clicking on random objects to figure out what I'm supposed to do. There's an option to see a walkthrough for the current area, which is a must for this game to be playable, but you have to play a side scrolling shooter mini game to unlock it. I don't like reading the whole walkthrough, just the steps I need to get me a bit further. Unfortunately every time you open the walkthrough, even for the same screen, you have to do this damn shooter thing. This game is so annoying, it drove me to stop playing and sign up to metacritic just to write this review!!!

    On the other hand, it's a nice concept and I enjoyed it for the first hour or so.
    Expand

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