What I love about casual games is their ability to be beautiful and elegantly relaxing. Elemental is just such a game in many respects. The setting is a beautiful Celtic inspired world of natural elements, and the mood is serene. Bringing to mind a quiet waterfall or a secluded glen, the game conveys beauty of the natural world. I appreciate that it has no real story, and I respect the simplicity of the controls and the gameplay. Like a Japanese garden, the game has pruned out all the unnecessary elements and left only what is needed. Almost, anyway.
The gameplay is simple – there are two elements on any game board, and you must flip the elements from one to another to match groups of the same color. While you do this, more times pushing up from below. You keep flipping until you dig down to some arbitrary line below. It’s pretty simple, but the drag-select control gives the action much the same appeal as popping bubbles of packing material. You’ll zone out pretty hard on this, so keep an eye on the clock.
The music and sound is on the upper end of standard, and the menus are especially well done and clean. Like I said, there is no meaningful story, but you won’t miss it. Quite the opposite, it’s nice to not have to fight through all of the screens to get to the game. There are two main modes, the main game and the challenge, which is reminiscent of the old 2-player Puzzle Fighter games.
If there is a problem with the game, it is that it can be a bit too simple at times. With a lack of variables to play with to make the game harder, the developers were left with making the tiles appear faster, which just increases the frustration and stress of the game, which is a shame. Also worth mention is the help system, which is unnecessarily strict, and can create more confusion than it solves. We suggest just turning it off – the game’s simple enough to learn without it.
Overall, it is a beautiful and clean game with refreshingly implemented if not exactly revolutionary gameplay. Definitely worth checking out.
Review by
Nick Kojima
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