Candle: The Power of the Flame is an action adventure with an emphasis on solving puzzles and surviving a hostile environment. The combination of the remarkable graphics, simple yet testing gameplay and beautiful South American flavored soundtrack all conspire to make Candle: The Power of the Flame and experience you won’t forget. The game's visuals are presented as beautiful hand-drawn watercolor images - all the layered backgrounds, characters and objects have been individually painted and scanned into the game. It feels as though you are playing a living painting.
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An endearing graphic adventure debut from Spanish developers Teku Studios that seems to have been completely underappreciated by the gaming community. The story involves a mission to save your village elder and its overall tone balances between one that is both charming and savage.
The game is beautifully presented through the use of water-colour backgrounds and characters. In many ways it brings to mind 90s hallmarks like Oddworld's prerendered digital backgrounds or the sumptuous oil paintings of James Gurney's Dinotopia graphic novels. The other standout aesthetic is the incredible soundtrack by Pascual De Gállego. It pairs well with the world and provides fantasy folk music that never tires no matter how long a puzzle takes you.
Speaking of gameplay, much of its DNA also derives from early cinematic platformers like Oddworld: Abe's Oddysee and Another World. Staples include a hapless defenceless protagonist, individual "roomed" stages with continuous backtracking , a degree of trial and error, and a walking gait that is a little awkward. Many reviewers seem to have attributed that last part to poor controls, but I'd say it's intended and part of the genre's tropes. Teku feels just like Abe and Lester.
Although the majority of the puzzling is a joy to work out (and there's some great in-world board-game puzzles to play too), the core of this gameplay element derives not from cinematic platformers like the above but rather point-and-click adventure mechanics from 90s games like Broken Sword. In other words, in the collecting of strange objects to reassemble in different places. Most are fine, but are a handful of puzzles seem overwrought and too ambiguous for their own good.
Overall, if you're a fan of cinematic sidescrollers, especially in the vein of Oddworld & Another World, this is the definitive legacy game and certainly worth checking out.
The game is beautifully presented through the use of water-colour backgrounds and characters. In many ways it brings to mind 90s hallmarks like Oddworld's prerendered digital backgrounds or the sumptuous oil paintings of James Gurney's Dinotopia graphic novels. The other standout aesthetic is the incredible soundtrack by Pascual De Gállego. It pairs well with the world and provides fantasy folk music that never tires no matter how long a puzzle takes you.
Speaking of gameplay, much of its DNA also derives from early cinematic platformers like Oddworld: Abe's Oddysee and Another World. Staples include a hapless defenceless protagonist, individual "roomed" stages with continuous backtracking , a degree of trial and error, and a walking gait that is a little awkward. Many reviewers seem to have attributed that last part to poor controls, but I'd say it's intended and part of the genre's tropes. Teku feels just like Abe and Lester.
Although the majority of the puzzling is a joy to work out (and there's some great in-world board-game puzzles to play too), the core of this gameplay element derives not from cinematic platformers like the above but rather point-and-click adventure mechanics from 90s games like Broken Sword. In other words, in the collecting of strange objects to reassemble in different places. Most are fine, but are a handful of puzzles seem overwrought and too ambiguous for their own good.
Overall, if you're a fan of cinematic sidescrollers, especially in the vein of Oddworld & Another World, this is the definitive legacy game and certainly worth checking out.
The art style was so captivating I had to play it! Cute little game with some challenging puzzles. The lore was a little overbearing but I still enjoyed it! The score was so much fun also!
It looks great but I was immediately put off by the long intro-cutscene that had (to me) not very interesting world-building exposition. After that, I controlled my character which unfortunately did not feel very good and the first thing they asked me to do was light torches (yawn).
The game's art style is incredible and the soundtrack is pretty good as well. Unfortunately I felt actively bored by the story and controlling my dude just didn't feel nice.
The game's art style is incredible and the soundtrack is pretty good as well. Unfortunately I felt actively bored by the story and controlling my dude just didn't feel nice.