Game Review: Inked - A Tale of Love

Inked: A Tale of Love is another fantastic example of why indie video games are worth your time and money. I never knew about this game until recently after I was looking for some indie experiences to play on my Nintendo Switch. Inked was a game I saw quite a few times on a few indie highlight articles and after giving the game a quick preview I figured I’d take a crack at the game and see if it’s worth the praise it was getting. After finishing up my run on the game I can honestly say the game is well deserving of it’s praise and stands out as one of the better independent titles you can play on the portable system. 

Developed by a Croatian developer called Somnium Games, Inked: A Tale of Love is a isometric puzzle game which utilises a line paper aesthetic. Originally releasing on PC back in 2018 through the help of publisher Starbreeze Studios; the title was eventually ported onto most mainline consoles in 2021 by Pixman. The core setup of the game is you play a Nameless Hero as he traverses a variety of intricate levels, using your problem-solving skills to traverse each puzzle and proceed onto the next area. 

The narrative of Inked is told through an overarching perspective. The Nameless Hero and his wife live a blissful life within the illustrated world they are drawn in. On their way home one day, the pair find a collection of hurt animals. With the help of the ever-present narrator/illustrator the hero and his wife venture forth on a quest to determine the cause of the animals suffering. To determine this, they must travel across the pages of the world outlined to them by the illustrator, with each world they travel, they discover more and more about the motivations behind the illustrator and what trauma links him and the duo together as the story progresses. 

There’s a serious amount of quality layered within this game’s narrative. Despite being a simple puzzle game at its core, I really admire how the team at Somnium used the confines of their world to express a very heartfelt tale of love and grief. I found the game’s story beats empathetic and emotional in a way that felt very respectful.  I must admit though I felt when the story choose to be more interpretive with its concepts it worked a lot better than when the illustrator chimed in. I have nothing against the illustrator’s story but my main issue is his voice. The man voicing his character had very little range or emotion in his voice work so it made it difficult empathise with him much with such dry delivery. 

When it comes to gameplay though, that’s the main bread and butter of this games core appeal. Each world within this game presents the player with a theme that ties into the gameplay presentation of the levels within it.  This variation in design and technical offering helps to keep the games challenge constantly progressing in a way that is engaging both visually and technically.  The main foundation of Inked’s gameplay is isometric physics and shape puzzles. You are presented with shapes and obstacles you need to manipulate in order to overcome them and progress to the new trials. The way these puzzles are presented to never feels unfair, they’re simplistic in design yet always encourage you to think logically in how to move items and shapes to come to an appropriate solution. While they feel fun to solve and overcome, I feel a need to recognise the control scheme for these puzzles leaves a little bit to be desired. It’s means of selecting objects in the environment and moving them is quite clunky on the Nintendo Switch and I found I was constantly battling the controls as much as I was the puzzles. 

Audio and visuals are probably the most pristine aspects of Inked. As this game presents itself within a world illustrated with a ball-point pen aesthetic there’s a clear charm to all of it. The line paper style helps to give off the impression these environments were all hand drawn on paper in real life. The detail and variety in these worlds develops constantly as you progress through the game with the introduction of colour and more geometric aspects within the locations. The soundtrack to this game complements the games beautiful design with a very tranquil selection of tracks. There’s a nice sense of ambience layered within the instrumental use for each world that helps to individualise them even more. 

Inked: A Tale of Love is a very solid experience. It’s not without its faults but they are minor aspects in comparison to the game’s greater successes. It’s a short experience but what’s here presents you with a very unique world with some clever puzzles to captivate you.  It’s best element for me is the way it uses all of these concepts to weave a tale of love in many different forms. If you are in the mood for a charming puzzle game then I would highly recommend this game.