Braid (Xbox 360)

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Description

Braid is a puzzle game disguised as a 2D platformer. The player controls Tim during his search for a princess he has known and lost. Although the objective appears to be rather straightforward at first, the meaning and the motives become much more implicit and are interwoven with the mechanics during the course of the game. From a main hub, Tim can eventually access six worlds that consist of different areas. The start of each world reveals a part of the Tim's background and emotions, rather than progressing a storyline. The second to the sixth world can be entirely explored without solving all the puzzles. Difficult situations can be ignored and revisited later. When all worlds have been completed, the first one becomes available and brings closure to the story.

The game's concept is entirely based around time manipulation. Tim cannot die permanently as the player can rewind time at any moment and usually for any length, even all the way back when an area was entered. While rewinding, the music is synchronized in a similar fashion. Rather than a gimmick, rewinding is an essential element to solve the puzzles. The different worlds give a spin to the mechanic by introducing clones as the player collaborates in a parallel reality with a past version of himself, time can be affected through the movement direction, and Tim can create a circular area to cause time dilation. Certain items, enemies and parts of the scenery are immune to time manipulation or behave in a very different way. Puzzles require close examination of the environment and the behaviour of different items and enemies. As such, the game is entirely about solving the puzzle theoretically by applying the game mechanics and then using trial and error to executive it and discover possible flaws in the proposed logic. This also brings limited replayability to the game.

A world is solved by collecting the puzzle pieces. These need to be arranged and eventually show a picture related to the game's story. There is no filler in the level design, meaning that every platform, item or game element (except for a few enemies) has a specific purpose to solve a puzzle. Fast times can be tracked in a separate speedrun mode.

The later released Windows and Macintosh versions are identical, but come with a level editor.

Screenshots

Promo Images

Alternate Titles

• "ブレイド" -- Japanese spelling

Part of the Following Groups

• Gameplay feature: Time Manipulation
• Japanese PlayStation 3 game releases with full English support
• Middleware: SDL

User Reviews

Easy to play, hard to get

Sciere (534966)

Critic Reviews

Game Shark	Aug 20, 2008	A	100
The A.V. Club	Aug 12, 2008	A	100
Eurogamer.net (UK)	Aug 06, 2008	10 out of 10	100
Gaming Nexus	Aug 11, 2008	A+	100
Play.tm	Aug 19, 2008	94 out of 100	94
Planet Xbox 360	Aug 21, 2008	9.3 out of 10	93
Totally Gaming Network	Aug 12, 2008	9 out of 10	90
IGN	Aug 04, 2008	8.8 out of 10	88
Indie Game Magazine	Oct 13, 2008	87 out of 100	87
HardGamers	Aug 17, 2008	85 out of 100	85

Forums

Topic	# Posts	Last Post
Recommended literature	10	Sciere (534966) Sep 07, 2008

Trivia

1001 Video Games

Braid appears in the book 1001 Video Games You Must Play Before You Die by General Editor Tony Mott.

Budget

Developer Jonathan Blow said he invested about $180,000 of his own money in a three year period to create the game.

Inspiration

In an interview with the website Joystiq on 25th September 2008 Jonathan Blow cites the musical influences that initially lived in the same emotional neighborhood as Braid: the album Horse Stories by Dirty Three, the music of Lisa Gerrard, and the soundtrack to Dead Man by Neil Young.

References

Many of Braid's levels appear to draw their names from various cultural sources: level 3.2 -- There and Back Again -- is from fictitious hobbit Bilbo Baggins' autobiographical account of his adventures in author J.R.R. Tolkien's The Hobbit, while level 3.4 -- The Ground Beneath Her Feet -- is named either after a book of the same name by author Salman Rushdie or the U2 song also inspired by the book. Level 3.6 -- Irreversible -- suspiciously shares a title with a French film told employing an unorthodox time flow, while levels 4.2 -- Jumpman -- and 6.6 -- Elevator Action -- are names of video games. (Level 6.7 -- In Another Castle -- is one of many nods this game plays to the great granddaddy of the platform genre, Super Mario Bros.)

Awards

• GameShark
  • 2009 - Best Xbox Live Arcade Game
• GameSpy
  • 2008 – XBLA Game of the Year
• IGN
  • 2009 - Overall Best Puzzle Game
  • 2009 - Best PS3 Puzzle Game
  • 2009 - Best PC Puzzle Game

Information also contributed by Big John WV and Sciere

Related Web Sites

• Braid (Official game website)
• Braid (TIGdb entry.)
• Mac Gamer Review (A review of Braid by the Mac Gamer's Brad Snios, who had a generally favorable outlook on the game and its nature as a port (July 17th, 2009).)
• Podtoid 66: Braidtoid (A podcast with Jonathan Blow about the game design, hosted on Destructoid (21st August 2008))
• The aesthetics of puzzle game design — A good puzzle game is hard to build (Interview on puzzle game design to Jonathan Blow, author of Braid, along with Sokobond's Alan Hazelden, and Jonathan Whiting, co-author of Traal.)
• The Art Of Braid: Creating A Visual Identity For An Unusual Game (Artist David Hellman explains his collaboration with Jonathan Blow to create the art for the game, on Gamasutra (5th August 2008))
• Wikipedia: Braid (article in the open encyclopedia about the game)
• X360A achievement guide (X360A's achievement guide for Braid.)