14 DAY TRIAL // 
Portal unleashed the puzzle genre, proving you do not need an adventure behind the mind-bending challenges in order to be entertaining. In the last 14 years we had several games that pushed the boundaries and offered us memorable experiences like The Witness or The Talos Principle. Is the newest escape experience simulator worthy of our time or should we just rather on the Xmas dinner?
One of the first things that attracted to me to Faraday Protocol was the art style, that is an eclectic mix of Egyptian statues and art deco borrowed from the shiny clubs of the 1920’s America. In the trailers the game looks shiny and sharp, but up close it is somewhat underwhelming due to the limited number of elements that are repeated over and over again.
This is true not only about the presentation and the visuals but also about the game mechanics. Equipped with an energy converter device, eerily similar to a laser gun from the 70’s sci-fi movies, you will become Raug Zeekon, a galactic archaeologist. Playing through the game you cannot expect too much of a story, or any plot twists. The slim narrative is there just as an excuse to push you exploring further and further the strange ziggurats.
Still, after a confusing awakening in an immaculately white ship and solving test after test, you will discover that you were sent to investigate a strange signal coming from the planet you just landed on. Trying to search around for any sign of intelligent life, you will be met only by the flora that seems to flourish without any intervention from more evolved life forms.
As soon as you enter the first strange edifice, that is called a ziggurat, the cultural confusion is complete: an alien planet, an AI that speaks perfect English, structures inspired the ancient Mesopotamian culture, full of statues and burial urns borrowed from the ancient Egyptians. But leaving the multicultural cacophony and nit-picking aside, after you pick up your only tool, you will start a series of tests.
In order to forward Faraday Protocol, you will have to solve a series of tests or challenges, consisting of multiple puzzles focusing traversal and energy manipulation. Your gun can absorb, store and shoot the energy in order to activate switches or connect up power nodes. The two different kinds of energies can be transformed using the right statues and can block your way due to the different energy barriers placed in different doors.
As mentioned before, despite the enticing art style, the graphics are pretty basic and as a result the rooms are pretty empty. Despite the bare necessities needed to solve the different puzzles, you will only encounter the same and same onyx statues. The only variety appears in the handful of cutscenes that try to give a context to your logical wanderings.
The gameplay mechanics follow the same pattern, there being only a handful actions you can undertake. The good news is that the developers of Faraday Protocol managed to combine them in a very satisfactory way. There are multiple ways to solve the more complex challenges and there are also many dead ends, that can take up your time and brain power to solve but will not help you advance.
The path forward is not always obvious and is always tricky. You will activate platforms, open doors, hunt for secrets, convert energy types and complete test after test for long hours. Due to the lack of a hint system and any helping mechanism, Faraday Protocol can be a long experience, even up to ten hours.
The game itself is short if you know what you are doing, it can be finished in 60-90 minutes. But since it is not the case, you will spend some time figuring out how to advance. Once you figure things out there is no real motivation to start over. Yes, you can find new ways to solve the puzzles and shave of minutes or even hours from your playthrough but there is no reward for doing any of these brave endeavors, beyond personal satisfaction.
The pace of the puzzles that grow in difficulty is very smooth and you will go painlessly from pushing a couple of buttons to solving puzzles that stretch over multiple rooms. In the end you can choose one of the two endings that conclude the whole experience, but there is no big revelation or lifechanging conclusion. The challenge of solving the tests from the planet Opis are the actual reward.
The Good
- Interesting mix-up of cultures
- Smooth difficulty curve
- Some tricky puzzles
The Bad
- Somewhat empty rooms
- Can become a bit monotonous
- Not too much of a replay value
Conclusion
If you like puzzle games Faraday Protocol is one you do not want to miss. If you are a newcomer to the genre better start somewhere else and circle back later to this game, when you already have some experience.
Review code provided by the publisher.
