Game: Energy Cycle Edge
System: Nintendo Switch
Developer/ Publisher: Sometimes You
Price: £4.49|$4.99 |€ 4,99
Age Rating: Europe 3+| America E
Release Date: December 5th 2018
Also Available On: Xbox, PS4, PS Vita
Review code kindly provided by Sometimes You
Sometimes You have released a puzzle game on the Nintendo Switch, this is the second game in this series. Energy Cycle is the first game and it’s also available on the Eshop.
Cycle through three colours for each orb
Energy Cycle Edge is billed as a puzzle game, the player is presented with a black screen with coloured cells and 44 puzzles in the game that are all opened from the start. The puzzles are two dimensional and in the later levels they turn to three dimensional. When you are playing the three dimensional ones, you can turn the puzzle around by pressing the L or R buttons.
The idea is to make all cells on screen the same colour ( which ever colour you pick ) changing the colours to match on all sides of the puzzle, you can change a cell by highlighting it with the cursor and pressing A and the orb cycles through the three colours.
Sounds easy you might say, but there is a catch….if you move say the top right cell to orange any adjacent cell vertically or horizontally will move as well and not always to the same colour…you have to cycle through the 3 colours until you get the one to match but during that the rest of the cells in that row change to a non matching colour.
A tutorial is in order!
I haven’t played the first game but I’m a long time gamer who has played so many puzzle games through the year’s I’ve lost count. I had watched a few intro videos of the game and thought it look’s like my sort of game. That’s when I decided to take the review code of the game.
However when I started the game and got past the start screen I was faced with the first puzzle. A black screen with coloured cells and a cursor which is coloured green ( the same colour green as one of the cells). No tutorial what so ever, no words on the screen, no handy hints if you get stuck, not a thing to help….ok not the end of the world I figured. I moved the cursor around and changed some cells…over fifteen minutes later I still hadn’t solved the first puzzle. By then I knew that changing a cell any adjacent cell in a horizontal or vertical line would change as well, still that didn’t help.
I went back and watched a few more videos and I didn’t learn anything new, but since then I have been able to solve some of the puzzles though I wasn’t always sure how I did solve them half the time. 🙄
Difficulty curve goes up sharply
The game looks plain with just the black screen and cells, but that’s fine. It’s a puzzle game where the quality of puzzles is what matters. Energy Cycle Edge has a lovely ambient soundtrack which is great to listen to while you complete the puzzles or should I say if you try to complete them. 😂
As you work your way through the 44 levels, the puzzles change from two dimensional to three. The difficulty curve goes up very sharply indeed….frustratingly so!
The soundtrack as I said is lovely but it doesn’t change if say you have half the puzzle completed. There is no reference via the music to suggest how far into completing the puzzle you are!
Hand holding isn’t necessary
Overall Energy Cycle Edge’s 44 puzzles will keep you puzzling for a while. And for the pricetag of under £5 it will certainly keep you puzzling for a lot longer if you have not played the first game in the series.
The lack of a tutorial or any help within the game lets it down. It’s as if you are expected to have played the first game and you should know what you’re doing. I feel I shouldn’t have to watch videos to see how the game is played from the very start. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t need my hand held while playing a game. But for anyone playing a game for the first time, is it not best to at least lay out the workings of the puzzle they have to complete? It would save a lot of frustration on the players’ part!
The cursor being the same colour as the green cell didn’t help my play through either. Sometimes I couldn’t find the cursor, when the cursor is resting on a green cell there is no definition between them. They blend together.
If you have played the first game and enjoyed it, there is no reason why you would not enjoy the same kind of puzzles in this game. If you are new to the series like me, then expect a frustrating challenge. For that reason it has to be a not sure.
