Escher in Escherland: The Bridge Review

by Dayv
I've always had a fondness for artsy games, so The Bridge, by Ty Taylor and Mario Castañeda, caught my attention pretty quick.  An intriguing physics-based puzzler based on the art of MC Escher (like those crazy staircases, or the impossible waterfall, or...this),The Bridge has you stepping into a world of impossible structures and fickle gravity, where you'll be walking on the walls/ceilings and avoiding being crushed by strangely menacing boulders.

Playing as what looks to be Escher himself roaming around in a world of his own artwork, your goal in each level is simply to get through the exit door. Unfortunately the door is usually locked, and even more unfortunately it is also often hanging from vertical surfaces, in a different phase of reality, or just the wrong color.

The game is apparently set before the civil rights movement

To get to the door you'll rotate the world around you, via the arrow keys, turning every wall and ceiling into a potential floor. Being inspired by the work of MC Escher, the levels can feel a little trippy, and often the first challenge is just figuring out how things are actually laid out.

Like any good puzzle game, The Bridge takes a simple mechanic and tests your ability to master it. While the first few levels can be passed with some haphazard level turning, tossing our dear artist about like an old man caught in the funhouse barrel room, you'll soon find yourself needing to juggle keys and the previously mentioned boulders as you turn the world end over end. As you progress through the game, new obstacles and tools are introduced pretty regularly, so rarely does a new puzzle feel like just more of the same. Even with the second half of puzzles refereed to as 'mirrored' versions of the first set, they each had significant enough changes from their originals that it didn't feel like I was just replaying a swapped version (which I was a bit afraid of at first). Though not actually used for for solving the puzzles, there is also a rewind mechanic similar to Braid's which allows you to rewind from an error instead of needing to restart a level after each mistake (which is awesome because you'll likely make a ton).

The Bridge does manage to set its own pace, however, and it is a determinedly casual one. It is not a game meant to be sped through—even your character refuses to walk at more than a comfortable stroll. It took me a bit to realize, but rarely (perhaps only once or twice) can a puzzle be solved by speed. If you find yourself trying to race around a corner before a boulder crushes you, I recommend you try a new tactic.

This isn't exactly Raiders of the Lost Ark

The Bridge is a game of deliberation and careful juggling, and it refuses to be rushed. It is a rather nice visual experience, too, so just take your time and enjoy the scenery.

Even with the easy pace and all the little toys introduced throughout, though, one of my few complaints about The Bridge is that I would have simply liked more levels. With vortexes, color-coded keys and doors, levels with alternate phases, multiple characters to simultaneously control, and even multiple gravities to contend with, I just felt like there was potential for more combinations, more ways to frustrate my brain. The puzzles always managed to stay fresh, but I felt like I barely got more than an introduction to some elements, which is unfortunate because I enjoyed most of them.

But overall I had a pretty damn good time with The Bridge, even when I was just staring blankly at the screen and insisting this one was impossible (it turned out it wasn't). So if you feel like trying something a little trippy, or you've always secretly wanted to roam around inside an MC Escher drawing, The Bridge is available on Steam, as well as thebridgeisblackandwhite.com.