Iris.Fall [Xbox]
A puzzle-adventure game at its core, NExT Studios’ Iris.Fall sees you play as Iris, a young girl who awakens from a creepy, cryptic nightmare and sees the same black cat from her dreams. Following the cat into a strange, abandoned theatre, Iris comes to find that she is in a world that has much more to it than meets the eye. It takes full advantage of lighting - allowing you to utilise your environments’ shadows to switch between the 2D shadow plane to the 3D ‘real world’ to find ways in order to progress.
There are seven chapters for you to work through, each with a fairly linear progression to them. Pick up items to create new shadows, and complete puzzles to craft a path onwards. The puzzles are a mixed bag, with some being simple to figure out, but others are a tad more confusing. Some of the puzzles you run into seem more complex than they are, with additional controls available that serve little purpose other than to bamboozle you. There’s a distinct lack of explanation when figuring out puzzles, which is sometimes expected to be fair, but you will sometimes find yourself messing with things to see what they do and still being clueless - until you inadvertently solve it. As you continue through the levels, you’ll learn a little more about the connection Iris has to each of these strange, unsettling places. There’s not a great deal of story to be had, but the mystery draws you in and makes the world all the more alluring.
Everything in Iris.Fall is stunning, with intricately detailed scenery filled with bleak scenes that are as equally as mesmerising as they are haunting. It is visually very interesting, with a gorgeous cel-shaded look and heavy emphasis on lighting and shadows that play far more of a part in the world than just for puzzles. As the story began, colour drained out of the scene, and you’ll notice that moving on through chapters will lead to some muted colour being restored here and there for emphasis. The levels are really well designed, and whilst you are stuck in a very limited, linear space, I would have enjoyed something a little more to the levels, such as collectibles or something else to keep an eye out for.
The music is very fitting for the world, and tends to make an appearance whenever puzzles are being completed. Walking around in the world feels progressively creepy and tense, with ambient environmental sounds being your main source of company. Whispering voices can be heard in the background, and whooshing wind and other assorted noises will have the hairs on the back of your neck stand up. With no dialogue, all of the information is just alluded to through the locations and different things you’ll spot along the way. There is a bit of an awkward translucent black bar that pops up on screen during cutscenes, that feels like it should be there to contain subtitles - but with no dialogue, there’s no subtitles to be had, so it just needlessly obscures some of the gorgeous art work.
Priced at £16.74 on the Xbox Store, Iris.Fall will give you around 3-4 hours of playtime max, which does feel a bit short. The levels and puzzles, as well as the gorgeous look, all make me wish the game was longer as I really enjoyed my time exploring this world, and having a little more payoff to all of the mystery would have been great, too. It’s a game we both had fun with, and is a good choice for achievement hunters too, as most will be gained with relative ease over the short run-time of the game. The puzzles were enjoyable, and whilst you do feel a bit of challenge at times, they can be figured out with a bit of trial and error, so it’s a good choice for kids, too.
In the end, we decided to give Iris.Fall the Collecting Asylum rating of 8/10.
Have you played Iris.Fall yet? What did you think of it?
Let us know in the comment below!
- V x
Thank you to NExT Studios for the Iris.Fall Xbox review code!
