'The Last Clockwinder' is special for being a game that would be impossible outside of VR. It is a fruit collecting, seed generating puzzle game that relies on physical dexterity as much as it does strategy. In order to build assembly line engines to perform the tasks of collecting, assembling, and storing fruit-based contraptions, 'The Last Clockwinder' has you perform physical actions that you record and that will then repeat ad nauseam. So the factory floor becomes filled with automaton bots that accomplish much more than you could alone. The puzzles are fun if not too varied. The different fruits behave differently and you'll come to enjoy working with some over others. Luftapples especially have a chaos to their movement that doesn't replicate as well in the time loops and that can lead to frustration.

The story, communicated entirely through audio, has a touch of emotion to it, but it isn't really a reason to play. Neither are the visuals which remain decidedly last gen here in this second generation of PSVR. This game would run just as well and look exactly the same on the first gen PSVR. But neither story nor visuals is a reason to avoid 'The Last Clockwinder.' It is a clever game that requires VR and is fun to play.

The Last Clockwinder is a middling execution of a really cool idea. Puzzles are based around automatons who will repeat the player's recorded actions indefinitely on timed cycles, allowing the player to set up chains of actions to accomplish tasks. So, the player records themselves picking and throwing fruit, then moves to the destination of the throw to catch and harvest the fruit. This is really fun and a great use of the VR medium.

There is a narrative underlying the puzzles which is mildly interesting, told through decently written conversations, executed by adequate voice actors. So, overall a pretty middling experience. The lack of tutorializing is largely subtractive, as most of the fun of the game comes from setting up intricate assembly lines rather than trying to intuit how to interact with new objects.

This isn't exactly a must-play for the PSVR2, but I do hope developers play this and take some cues from the more innovative elements. Sadly, without a really strong narrative or better puzzle scaling the game doesn't really have anything to hold onto long-term.

loved this game a lot more than I expected to going in - that might be my VR-pilled brain or something idk. Bless Backloggd for helping me find random games like this man, been wanting a Letterboxd type site for games exactly for this reason

Operates closer to a Factorio/Zachtronic type game than your usual puzzle game, although it doesn’t nearly reach the intricacies of those types of puzzlers. Instead, the game builds on its difficulty through the physicality of VR, which really helps elevate the puzzle rooms in a way pancake gaming can’t replicate: learning how to more efficiently use your clones and timing your actual movements to optimize each room is super rewarding, and standing back to watch the finished product is gratifying as fuck

It helps that the game’s aesthetic is suuuper cozy. From the soundtrack, the look of the clock tower & the cute little recordings you can listen to, everything works together. I could just sit back and watch my little robot clone dudes slave over for hours w/ the soundtrack and voice tapes on repeat

Been looking forward to exploring VR gaming some more and this game gives me a lot of hope towards its future - one of the (unfortunately) few VR games that feels like an actual full, albeit short, package.

This game really is a full package honestly. Satisfying automation, wholesome vibes with the art direction and score, a nice little story, and all under the guise of fun VR mechanics.

The puzzles were challenging enough, some were very daunting but ultimately very solvable and satisfying once you completed them.

There’s definitely some room for completionists here too with some of the challenges which were quite fun but start getting exceedingly difficult towards the end.

My only main issue the game had (which only became noticeable towards the last couple of levels) was how inconsistent some of your recordings could act with the physics of the objects in the game. Overall this wasn’t a massive issue but it led to some frustration on a couple of occasions.

Overall a genuinely great game and this studio deserves a lot of praise and support for whatever they decide to do next. One of my favorite games of 2022 now.