Glass Masquerade

Review

Prepare yourself to take a journey on a sensational art adventure around the world. Experience the visual art of stained glass in all its beauty. Each of the puzzles showcases a part of the culture for each individual country represented in the game. You start out in the first country, a blank play area with 4 rotating bands of puzzle pieces. Depending on whether or not the Hint fragments is enabled, you will have a few red-colored pieces that will a serve as a starting point to get assembling that puzzle. There are no other hints or previews of the completed images. As the pieces on the play field are void of color till you pick them up, you will mainly be matching shapes. You can pick up the pieces to see the image on them, which also will help you progress when visual cues for the shapes are not enough for you to spot where any pieces go. The levels vary in difficulty as you make your way across the map, each continent will have some easier and more difficult puzzles. This means you do not just start on easy and get harder and harder on the way, but they vary as you go; you may play a level 5 area then do a level 4 at the next country.



Released & self-published on Nov 18, 2016, by the developer Onyx Lute. This was their first release on Steam out of 2 currently.  There is a sequel to this title (released earlier this year) waiting for you after you finish this one. As a puzzle game, there are not a ton of mechanics to learn. The title is simple to grasp on how to play and I would rate it as casual. Its main feature is extravagant artwork; stained-glass has a long history with mankind for its beauty. It has been produced since the Egyptian and Roman times. We still have art existing today from the medieval period (yes, I have a fascination with stained-glass . . . back on track . . . ).  You can choose whether or not to use the hint system in the options.  You will get a varied number of pieces highlighted at the start of the puzzle, and it’s really simple to figure out where they go. For a more challenging play, disable them and you're on your own! It has a lovely mellow soundtrack that sets a nice relaxing atmosphere as you play.


For Options.
Video: Resolution, Fullscreen/Windowed, Vsync, Post FX's, Antialising, Hardware Cursor.

Audio: Sounds and Music Sliders

Game: Dial & Map Sensitivity Sliders. Hide Fragments on Start check box.

I found the title to be an exceptionally well-made game. I do not play the genre often because I am extremely color-blind. The way the mechanics of this puzzle work the pieces are all shadows with no color till you pick them up (which this is how I learned to do puzzles, by shape, not by color patterns so much). This is the main factor that allowed me to play the title and was greatly appreciated. It took me about 6 hours to play through with the added free DLC content, which is needed if you want to 100% the title. I did 100% the title during my playthrough. The level designs are well thought-out, and the puzzles are fairly intuitive as well. Even though we have no image to show us what the puzzle looks like when finished, I found myself often able to guess a piece’s position on the board by watching the shading of them. Yes, I see some color LOL. I found the DLC content to be a lot more challenging than the main game. My average time for completing the DLC puzzles was around 30 minutes. My average time for the main game was 8 minutes to 20 minutes for some 5-star difficulty. Those more adept at this type of puzzle will surely finish faster than I did; it still is good value for the asking price. With a medium replayability factor, you can return to beat your previous scores from time to time and enjoy the visual art once again. If you love a good puzzle, you’re in the right place. Grab your copy today!

 

Review written by DamageInc.for Zeepond.com!


Positives

+ Fantastic Visual Style
+ Lovely Soundtrack (available for free)
+ Steam Achievements
+ Steam Trading Card

Negatives

- No Controller Support

Review Summary

Glass Masquerade: A Breathtaking Visual Journey that Highlights the Beauty of the World through the Art Form that is Stained-Glass.

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Zeepond Rating: 9/10

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