So, I've beta-tested this (and created a few adventures for part 2), so I think I should post a little review of it, too.
First, I must admit that I'm a bit emotionally biased here. The original Wonderland game was pretty much the first puzzle game I've ever played and fallen in love with, which is more than ten years ago now, I think.
Still, after testing, I must say that it's once again a great puzzle game, and you should give it a go!
While the original Wonderland trilogy was a pretty classic box pushing puzzle game, the Wonderland Adventures trilogy has an quite interessting game concept. Like DROD, the game is grid-based, most entities can move diagonally and a big part of the game is monster manipulation. "
Magic"
, which is more or less the essence of the game, is fun to use, as it isn't restricted to the 8 basic directions.
So what's the difference to DROD? First, the game is real-time, not turn-based, so there's also an action aspect to it. Luckily (in my opinion), the game mostly focuses on the puzzle aspect, but yeah, a certain amout of speed is needed. Second, it's unfortunately not entirely deterministic (stupid scritters!), but this only applies to a few rare cases, so it's not a game about luck.
The puzzles are also quite fun. Like most puzzle games do (unfortunately in my opinion), this one also starts out with a pretty flat learning curve, but trust me: Some of the later adventures get pretty tough and are definitely enjoyable for "
demanding"
players, though I don't think it reaches the difficulty JtRH or TCB. Without a doubt, though, they are very well designed and there are some sweet lynchpins to be figured out later in the game.
The graphics are sometimes criticised as being too childish for the difficulty. I don't think so; yes, they are a bit comic-y, but I think the aesthetics are really nice.
The plot in my opinion doesn't quite measure up to DROD's plot, but yeah, DROD sets the bar pretty high concerning that. I think It's still better than your average puzzle game's story.
Also, the creator announed to release a level editor for the newest version soonly, which I'm really looking forward to, as I think there's still a lot of room for innovative puzzles left.
To sum it up: Try out the demos for part 1 or part 2. Don't be put off by the simplicity of the first few puzzles. If you think the game concept is interessting, go ahead and buy it. It's worth it
.
