Time to review a game about moving boxes around to escape from a dangerous archaeological mission. Developed by Toxic Games, let’s take a look at QUBE 2.

    Okay, before starting I just want to make it clear that I haven’t played the first game before the sequel, so if there’s something big that I’m missing it could be attributed to that. In any case, QUBE 2 starts off with our main character Amelia Cross passing out in a desert storm and subsequently waking up in a strange cube-obsessed facility.  

She’s told by another woman in her headset that to escape she must reach the top of the tower she’s in by solving puzzles and powering up the various elevators scattered around. Amelia gets on her feet, discovers the ability to manipulate the environment around her, and begins her ascent.

The story as a whole is pretty bog standard. Honestly, aside from a cool visual or audio effect here and there, it doesn’t provide the player enough motivation to be compelling. Despite the obvious inspiration from the Portal series, QUBE 2’s serious tone and lack of depth makes the adventure feel uninspired and the absurdly game-like room design seem out of place.

Visually however the game fares much better. While nearly everything is made of cubes, the clean textures and lighting along with some beautiful setpieces make for an engaging environment to explore. The only downside is the overuse of camera wobble when walking the makes Amelia come off as drunk, but much like real alcoholism you get used to it after a while.

The gameplay here is your standard puzzle fare- simple mechanics fleshed out and combined to make for tricky mind-benders involving moving boxes, bounce pads, buttons to push, and environment manipulation. It’s really well executed and I very rarely experienced a bug or glitch, with only one or two annoying platforming segments that were overcome with time.

In each room, Amelia is given the ability to use many of the environment’s tools as well as her power glove to try and reach a clear goal at the end. Her glove has the three abilities to create boxes, bounce pads, and extendable platforms from designated spots on the wall and floor.

She can also use various spots in the room to open up new options by sliding, rotating, magnetizing, and oiling up various locations as well as utilize various fans and buttons to help. All of this combines to make for some really cool and interesting puzzles that are fun to execute.

There aren’t many issues to discuss here. I mean, the hub rooms and long hallways can sometimes be excessive, but nothing too bad. I never got stuck in a room without a way out, never encountered an unsolvable puzzle, only encountered a floating platform glitch twice in the full 3 and a half hour playthrough, and left nearly every room with a grin, a sense of accomplishment, and the same thought, “That was neat.”

But that’s kind of the issue. Everything in this game, while clean and well done is just so basic. Sure, most rooms were satisfying, but very few were truly challenging. And yeah I walked out of puzzles with a grin, but never once did it turn into a full smile. The game is exactly what I expected going in. Nothing less, but nothing more.

All in all, QUBE 2 is a well designed game that while weak in terms of narrative and innovation, is incredibly strong when it comes to fun, satisfaction, and quality control. It’s definitely a title I can recommend to both hardcore and casual fans of puzzle games, which is why it gets a 7.5 out of 10.  Anyway, I hope you enjoyed this review, if you did, please consider subscribing for more. And until next time, have a mighty nifty day today!