Interactive: ustwo finally launch Monument Valley, a game you'll want to get lost in for days

Date
3 April 2014

If I’m honest I don’t give two hoots about the gaming industry in general. When I was a kid I lost two years to The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time on the N64, and I still have dreams about playing it; the characters I met in Hyrule, the tragic death of all the Zoran people and the battles I fought repeatedly until every one of the kingdom’s races were freed from Gannon’s wrath. My sense of nostalgia for that time is palpable. But then I found that no other game offered me the same escapism and abandoned the whole experience for good.

Then Steve at ustwo sent me a trial version of Monument Valley just before Christmas and I remembered why I used to love playing these things – so much so in fact that I spent the duration of a reasonably expensive gig tapping away on my screen until I’d completed it.

Simply put, you have to guide a lost princess through a series of physically impossible mazes, filling in the pieces of her mysterious past along the way. Sounds simple enough, but it’s got more or less everything I enjoy in a computer game including a strong fantasy storyline, serious problem-solving instead of straight-up violence, immaculate aesthetics, attention to detail and that all-important, impossible-to-place addictiveness that can only be achieved when a group of die-hard gamers pool their collective wisdom.

Anyway, the full version is out today and I for one will be playing it until my fingers bleed. I suggest you do the same, even if it means taking a sick day to see it through from start to finish.

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ustwo: Monument Valley

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ustwo: Monument Valley

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ustwo: Monument Valley

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ustwo: Monument Valley

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ustwo: Monument Valley

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ustwo: Monument Valley development

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ustwo: Monument Valley development

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ustwo: Monument Valley development

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About the Author

James Cartwright

James started out as an intern in 2011 and came back in summer of 2012 to work online and latterly as Print Editor, before leaving in May 2015.

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