Stacking

Double Fine's Stacking

What a fun little game! Charmed the hell out of me. It's casual, more like an action/puzzle game, but it sure is effective.

It's a steampunk-like world in which everyone is a Russian stacking doll. Charlie Blackmore is a tiny doll who has the ability to stack with other dolls and take control of them. Each doll has a unique ability, which he uses to solve puzzles and rescue his family from an evil baron who's enslaving children.

Puzzles are relatively simple, but still require you to pay attention to your environment. Stacking with random dolls and playing with their special abilities is fun and rewarding. In fact, it's required. You need to know who's around you and what they can do in order to solve the puzzles and move to the next level.

There are multiple solutions to every puzzle, doll sets to find, unique dolls to "collect", pranks you can play. There's a lot of extra things in the game to keep you busy, and they're not just pointless busywork. They're fun to complete!

The style is charming, tongue-in-cheek, and lighthearted. Won't be much of a game for the shooter crowd or adventure game fans looking for a serious challenge, but the game strikes a nice balance between casual challenge and G-rated fun.

I bought this one without even playing a demo. The style and concept won me over. I had to find out how a game of stacking dolls would play out, and it was a fun little game!