The Pillar Reviews

Sure, there are similarities to The Witness, but there's a bit more variance in the puzzle types, and they can often be a bit more challenging in a way. A brain-teasing but also relaxing puzzle game - recommended!

Reminded me of The WItness, but this game isn't of the same calibre. The game is short enough to not mind the repetitive puzzles and the collectibles and levels make up for it as well. Definitely worth the time I put in.

Some interesting gameplay. Some pleasant, colorful graphics. Puzzles are in some ways similar to those in The Witness. However, the episode in the 3rd part where you are supposed to get a pillar to turn so you can read a 4-digit code (randomly generated) on it is really a game stopper. The pillar does not rotate as I play, the code cannot be seen, and therefore there is nothing else you can do. The developer posted a You-Tube video that some people found helpful, but I did not. I played the level again, more than once, with the same dismal result. I have no more time to waste on this.

Fun after the first level, but the puzzles are the same each round and gets really repetitive. Not recommended, even on sale.

In the likeness of Witness (obviously) but much more relaxed and easier. Overall it's worth it at about roughly $5 on sale if you want a chill easy puzzle game. A few notes that would make it play better: - remove all the cutaways where the camera pans they are annoying and unnecessary - right-click should exit the puzzles - there should be a button to clear the puzzle for easy start over - remove the background music in favor of ambiance - mosaics should fit into the game better instead of being optional collectible

An amazing game with some flaws. Still, well worth playing! The first flaw here is the performance, which in my case has been awful on both high and ultra settings. Sometimes dipping way under 30 fps. The second one is inconsistency in puzzle difficulty. Which isn't really that bad, since the puzzles were very easy in the first levels. I must praise the devs for amazing graphical direction, i absolutely love it. Ability to disable mouse smoothing is also very welcome. The game is absolutely teeming with potential. It is very hard to not compare it to the masterpiece that is The Witness, yet i still hope the game will have some environmental puzzles later on.

In the words of James May: "No.". It's a pity. The programming is competent. Good use is made of the Unity game engine. The environment is colourful and pretty, though completely ripped off of a well known game. Perhaps one could call it a tribute. I didn't find any bugs, though I thought I did several times because the game design is a bit strange. And that's the problem. Numerous questionable design decisions spoil the game. It carefully explains how to solve a particular puzzle type, but presents a single use of that puzzle type which works differently. It features a bright, powerful, dangerous-looking laser beam ... which in its first appearance shines right through where you have to be standing without harming you. There are a number of different puzzle mechanisms, one of which is so fast, and requires such a quick memory, that I cannot solve it without watching a playback outside the game. Things you change, change the environment with appropriate sound-effects, but you can't see what changes because the game forces you to look away as it happens. It's such a pity, because the graphics and programming, and the setup and features, show there is a good game at the base of this. Perhaps a children's version of [i]The Witness[/i]. But it's too difficult for children. And I can't think of any group of people who would want to play this and would find it easy enough to be fun. A few weeks spent cleaning up some of the problems would make it into a terrific fun game, for kids and for casual exploration gameplayers. which would be worth the current price. Either wait until the developers fix the problems, or until it's on sale. Sorry about that.

The Pillar is that kind of game I'll play when my mind is all over the place and I need to calm myself from feeling stressed out. It brings serenity and peace of mind. It's like having your own Zen garden. At first glance this looks like a puzzle game but if you seek to work out your brain to the max, this game isn't for you. The puzzles are easy. But that's a good thing. The Pillar has a very distinct, calm flow and puzzles here are to support that flow. The Pillar is that kind of game that was created with solid vision and understanding of what it wants to achieve. Does everything to fill that vision and succeeds.

I don't like giving negative reviews, but in this case it is unfortunately necessary. The game just wasn't enjoyable for me in any way. It got tedious and frustrating really quick. Many of the puzzles don't follow any rhyme or reason, at least none that was obvious to me. The level design is pretty uninspired and exhausting. Overall I didn't have a good time playing this game. Only buy this if it's on sale. [u]What I liked:[/u] [list] [*]The game looks beautiful. [*]The soundtrack is nice. [*]You can replay each level individually. [/list] [u]What I didn't like:[/u] [list] [*]Sometimes the color shades in the puzzles are extremely difficult to tell apart from one another, even if you have normal color vision. [*]The rules of the puzzles aren't always clear. [*]The color puzzles don't increase in difficulty over time, which makes them rather repetitive. Most of them were way too easy throughout the entire game. [*]Some color puzzles require you to memorize patterns. These start off doable, but get impossible really quick. I used my phone to record the sequence after a while because it became extremely frustrating otherwise. [*]While you don't get punished for getting something wrong, there are achievements for scoring a perfect run without any mistakes. If you want to get those achievements, you will probably need to play each level at least twice. [*]The ending of the final level requires you to walk a maze while the screen goes dark every other second. It's nauseating. I'm literally just writing this review after I had to stop playing because I got dizzy from this level. [/list]

This game had so much potential. It's got some cool graphics. It's okay that it looks like The Witness, that was a beautiful game and more games should look like it. And it's got some effects that look good in trailers. The problem is that the puzzles could have been generated by a random puzzle generator set to "easy" for the whole game. The very first puzzle you solve is ironically one of the most challenging because you don't yet know the rules. The last set of puzzles in the game are not much harder. In fact there are puzzles easier than the first one, in the last stage. It feels like the developers learned nothing from the great puzzle games that have come out in the last decade. On top of that, it feels like there was a lot of "mobile game" cruft piled on top to extend the gameplay. Lots of little doo-dads and doohickeys that don't do anything. There's lasers, but why? You point a laser at a mirror and then point the mirror at another mirror and you've "solved" the puzzle. There's no challenge at all. It's like they just wanted to throw some lasers in for some reason. There's also "puzzles" where you have to walk around the level several times to literally click a button and then walk around again to click another button. It's not hard to figure out because there's literally nothing else to do. It's just painful. The game looks nice and looks like a labor of love so I don't want to be mean, but a little extra thought would have made this mildly enjoyable. As it is, I unfortunately feel like I wasted my time.