Game Review: Botanicula

A while back, I was watching a stream on Twitch TV where one of the viewers requested the caster to play Botanicula. From the moment the game started, I was hooked. I not only wanted to play the game myself, I wanted everyone to know about it and play it as well. Recently, I streamed this game over at Community Casters Live. These are my thoughts on Botanicula.

The premise of the game is pretty simple. Some evil, black, spider thing has come to town and is sucking the life out of all the trees. Trees which house teeming amounts of life, including the group of "heroes" this game centers around. It is your job to protect a seed that escaped the bad spider, make your way to the ground with it, and plant it so it grows a new tree.

A simple story with a simple goal, but nothing could be further from the truth when it comes to actually playing this game. Botanicula is a quirky, point and click puzzle game that takes a grand step outside of the box. Personally, I'm not sure the designers of this game even knew that a box existed to begin with. The game has lots of unexpected happenings, interesting characters, and many peculiar things that make you simply want to click everything, just to see what it does.

There is really no description about this game that would do it any justice. The art style is very unique and lends itself to the whimsy and bizarre feelings the game produces. The characters in the game do not actually speak, but instead, simply make sounds and noises that resemble speech. I thought that was interesting. I absolutely loved the music, especially at the end of certain puzzles.

Botanicula is on the short side when compared to the play time of other games. Of course it does depend on how quickly you see patterns and solve puzzles. I would definitely recommend it, just for the experience alone. Everyone I know who has seen this game has asked "What is this?" and so far no one has come up with a comprehensive answer. We usually say something along the lines of "We aren't sure". It is a game, you should play it. I believe that will always be the best response.