It started out how a fun puzzle game should start out, showing you the basic mechanics and then adding tools one by one. It’s sort of like Lemmings but instead of having a bunch of lemmings walking to their death unless you tell them to use the tools, you have Toki Tori who doesn’t even move unless you tell him to. You still get (usually) limited amounts of each tool, but instead of waiting for the flow of lemmings to get to where you want the tool used, you just need to get Toki Tori there.

Toki Tori is a fun little distraction. If you’re not particularly experienced at puzzle platformers you may need more help than the built-in “wildcard” level skip affords, but if you’re not too proud to look for hints you’ll enjoy yourself.

The technology in Half-Life 2 doesn’t necessarily stand out anymore, but it still stacks up well against more recent games. This is especially true when you consider that Valve updates it regularly and it’s bargain priced at $9.99 on Steam. There are some great-looking scenes, especially now that I have a system that can max out the graphics settings, and while occasionally the gameplay is a little heavy on the “look, it’s physics!” it’s still a lot of fun! If you don’t already have this game I’d say buy it even for $10, and if you do have it you might want to play it again, especially if you have achievements to get.

The story and the writing style is exactly what I expected from Penny Arcade and probably my favorite part of the game. If you’re not familiar with Penny Arcade, you can get a good idea by just reading the last few comics. The art is a 3D, cartoony, steampunk style which I was also very into and again is what I expected from Penny Arcade.

The gameplay reminded me of Super Mario RPG. You explore until you run into an enemy and then jump into combat mode, where your party lines up against the enemies. Your main characters can perform their basic attack, special attack, or team up with other characters for 2- or 3-member team attacks. Instead of being turn-based, there’s a warm-up meter on each character that resets on each action.

If you’re looking for an RPG this game may disappoint you, but if you’re a fellow Penny Arcade fan looking for some RPG mixed in with a great story you’ll likely enjoy playing through this once and then letting it sit.