ilomilo is one of those rare games that comes along that looks interesting, but you don’t understand how brilliant it is until you get your hands on it. The game has an incredibly unique art style, blending bohemian tones with patchwork characters. The cute protagonists instantly put a smile on your face, and even the supporting cast is lovable. The world is very inviting.
Enhancing the impressive style of ilomilo is its terrific audio. While sound effects are appropriate and charming in their own way, the real star here is the music. Each track is layered with unique sounds from instruments that are less common in music these days. My favorite music most definitely was the selection from world four, which is heavy on accordion. The soundtrack, however, is second only to the gameplay.
In single player, the player controls both ilo and milo, switching between the two. In co-op still only one character can be controlled at a time, with the players still needing to switch characters. But, one player controls ilo, the other milo. The world is a series of boxes arranged in a floating space. Players arrange various types of other boxes to complete puzzles to reunite the characters. There is a box that stretches across a gap, a box that flies, or a box that flips the character to the other side of the stage. This is where things can get complicated, as players can move across all sides of the boxes making up the level, totaling six different planes that characters can move across. The trick is players are limited to specific spots that can be crossed over. The puzzles can get really challenging, but they scale so slowly that by the time you get to the really hard ones, you are used to the game and have developed a way to think the way it intends you to. By the end, Brittany and I only got stuck on a couple of puzzles, but it wasn’t anything that we found frustrating.
ilomilo is simply an amazing game. The game was very challenging, but always fun in its challenge. The visual style is unique and well executed, and the music is really something to pay attention to. ilomilo was very rewarding, especially when we finally figured out a puzzle we were stuck on. And most notably, it is charming in every sense of the word. This is a game that shouldn’t be missed.
ilomilo was a game that had a direct line to the “oh that’s so cute” section of my brain. The way ilo and milo interacted always made me smile. Aside from its adorableness, the game is challenging. The way it forced you to think outside the box can get pretty complicated, and I had some trouble thinking in the 3D space of the gameworld sometimes. It takes a lot of thinking ahead and planning to solve most puzzles, or else you are doing a lot of backtracking and trial and error.
The most important part of co-op is communication with your partner. Matt and I did best when we would explain our ideas of solving a puzzle before we began to solve it. That way, when switching between us, the other always knew what was going on. The game includes the nice feature in co-op that allows the person not playing at the time to control a little flying creature on the screen. This allowed Matt to show me where to place boxes visually, to avoid confusion caused by saying things like “put it right there.” It really was a big help.
I would recommend ilomilo to everyone that has the patience for trial and error puzzle games. It is worth full price if you have a good co-op partner because this really adds a lot to the game. However, if you plan on going it alone, maybe wait until it’s on sale before you decide to buy it.
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