Unwording Review (PC)

good
key review info
  • Game: Unwording
  • Platform: PC
  • Show system requirements
  • Gamepad support: No
  • Reviewed on:
Unwording key art

Tom gets into work, a depressing place on the best of days. No one seems to notice the bright yellow bird that arrives alongside him. When our character interacts with a previously solved world puzzle, the creature smashes through the words. It’s a metaphor for the way its presence destroys the negative way our character sees the world.

His new perspective also means a more complex puzzle. Previously, I only had to re-create words from blocks of letters. Now I need to move the blown-out letter cloud in three dimensions to find the words, before deciding their placement. I have two of them, one of which is “I”, but I cannot seem to get the alignment right for the last one, despite the fact that I know what I am looking for.

I could go to the Options and move the difficulty to Easy. But I think part of Tom’s journey involves working through obstacles rather than abandoning the effort. So I continue to spin the shattered words around, looking for a better angle to solve this puzzle.

Unwording is developed by Frostwood Interactive and published by the company in partnership with Dino Digital. I played on Steam on the PC. The title offers a character-focused adventure with puzzle elements.

Unwording
Unwording
Unwording
+4more

The story’s protagonist is a very average guy named Tom. He seems mildly depressed, finding it hard to get out of bed when players first get control of him. His mind is focused on negative thoughts and he is unable to see any beauty or engage with the world around him. The situation starts to improve soon when a small bird enters his life and introduces a new way of looking at things.

There’s no direct dialogue in Unwording, even if the game features plenty of words in its puzzles. Tom does not speak but there are messages he interacts with spread across the world. The game’s situations are all mundane, designed to emphasize the main character’s feelings and the ways even small things, like a car or other people eating a meal, can have a massive influence on one’s life.

The game’s world is very small, with exactly three locations for Tom to move through each day. They do change in terms of presentation but otherwise everything is the same. This might suggest that everything is happening inside his mind rather than in real space.

Or it might simply be a way to suggest how limited our freedom really is in the modern world and how much we depend on tech to console us while actual social connections wither. The experience is vague enough to support multiple readings.

Gameplay in Unwording uses two types of letter and word-driven puzzles. During the first day, Tom has to solve relatively simple problems that hinge around re-arranging blocks of letters. Gamers can spin them to create entirely new worlds. Pressing Space adds a set of hints that are very good at showing players what kind of phrase they should be building. There’s also a cheat block that can be used to reveal one correct letter placement.

On the second day, the puzzles evolve alongside the way Tom sees the world. The blocks of words are shattered by the yellow bird. Now players need to rotate them in 3D space to form words, again with a solid set of hints available. Once all the words are identified on the blocks, players also have to choose their correct order. Because the puzzle locations are the same between days, their evolution shows how Tom’s view of things changes.

The game has two difficulty levels. Easy allows players who find the mechanics too difficult to make progress with more hints and suggestions. It’s a good way to make sure that people get to see the entire narrative but an option to actually skip certain gameplay sequences would have been an even better idea.

When the world moves, as the game puts it, to full Technicolor, the puzzle elements disappear. Now Tom gets a text box when he interacts with something. That’s where players need to type an action for the character to act out in the real world. Take a look at the game’s achievements to get hints about some of the possible interactions.

The game is short. Tom is mostly a cipher and I was never invested in his reinvention effort. The puzzles never evolve and the simple typing of the third day is confusing. I appreciate the effort to create a video game that does not conform to traditional genres and explores mental states but the mechanics and narrative never come together to deliver an interesting package.

Unwording’s graphics shift as the player makes progress. The game starts off with a 2D side view that barely sketches both characters and environments. It’s a good way to show Tom’s lack of interest in the world around him and how negative his thinking can be. Once the yellow bird makes an appearance, the graphics shift to make its impact clear. Day two is spent in a 2.5 D world and day three moves to full 3D and clearer colors.

It’s a neat idea and allows developers to use limited resources to create some beautiful moments. The soundtrack also evolves as Tom moves from day to day but it remains too melancholy-filled for my tastes. The overall presentation serves the theme of the game well.

Unwording
Unwording
Unwording
+4more

The Good

  • Graphical evolution
  • Core puzzle concepts
  • Multiple potential interpretations of the story

The Bad

  • Limited gameplay
  • Static world
  • Some graphical glitches

Conclusion

Unwording is a short experience with a small number of puzzles and a barely sketched-out narrative. Tom is entirely unlike other video game protagonists, uninterested in most things around him and unexceptional. I’m not sure if he is depressed or if the spartan nature of his existence simply signifies his disgust with the modern world and its demands.

The two types of puzzles are initially interesting but after solving two or three of them they become busy work. The game needed either a bigger world, with more variety in terms of puzzle design, or extra focus on mechanical innovation. I wanted to like Unwording more but its core ideas are limited and the story is too simple.

A review key was provided by the publisher

story 8
gameplay 6
concept 7
graphics 7
audio 8
multiplayer 0
final rating 7
Editor's review
good
 
NEXT REVIEW: Mail Time

Unwording Screenshots (21 Images)

Unwording key art
UnwordingUnwordingUnwordingUnwording
+16more