Pity the poor kid in LIMBO. He’s got it tough right from the start, waking up alone in the middle of an eerie forest consumed by gloomy gray light.
He’s on his own, with only your finger swipes to guide him. Head right and the adventure begins, but you won’t get far without disaster striking; death comes quick and brutal in LIMBO. And often. Really often.
Even in the very first moments of the game, fail to see the spikes lining a pit in the ground and you’ll witness the first of many wince-inducing calamities. It gets worse. Mantraps lie in wait to snap our unfortunate hero in two. Climbing up a rope means shimmying past something grim, dead, and decomposing—there are flies everywhere. Urgh.
We’re beginning to think this place is booby-trapped. Step onto an unassuming fallen tree and a rolling boulder of death hurtles toward the boy, squishing him against the rocks with a bleak, moist crunch. Fall too far from a high spot and you’ll hear his bones crack when he hits the ground. Run into a dead end and suddenly you awaken a huge spiderlike creature with nasty, pointy, stabby legs. It impales him in a flash and then shakes him off, his lifeless body rag-dolling to the ground.
You’ll keep picking yourself up to start again, though. It might be grim at times, but LIMBO is one of the App Store’s all-time great indie games. Its sumptuous art style and stunning sound design conjure up a bleak but beautiful world unlike any other. It’s a masterpiece.