ElecHead

From the moment you first charge an object and cause your own electric destruction, to the last time you throw your head across a pile of spikes and frantically chase after it with your tiny headless body, ElecHead will keep teaching and challenging you with its creative tricks as it fosters a sense of wonder that’s rarely felt.

ElecHead is a wonderfully crafted action puzzle game that reminds us that simple can still be best. It features a wide variety of gimmicks, some of which are masterfully designed to outwit the player.

Nama Takahashi’s creation here is not the most extravagant nor is it the most lavish in detail, but that marriage of an easy-to-grasp gimmick and reliance on visual suggestion means ElecHead is not only striking, but joyous to play through too.

Short but memorable, this is a low-key triumph: if Japanese indie developer NamaTakahashi doesn't go on to even greater things, well, we'll be shocked. [Issue#365, p.119]

ElecHead is a minimalist work, which does not propose even a comma more than what is needed to play. The gameplay is straightforward, based on a few but interesting ideas, which intersect one puzzle after another. It probably won't be remembered as one of the most impactful puzzles of recent years, but fans of the genre certainly won't be disappointed.

ElecHead is an ingenious, compact, and elegant puzzle-platformer of wordless brilliance. [Eurogamer Recommended]

So many video games frustratingly outstay their welcome, dragging out once-novel ideas in service of hitting an arbitrary amount of gameplay time, because the too-ravenous gaming audience frequently correlates game length with quality. It's refreshing, then, when a game is careful and deliberate about its ideas, and exits stage left when it's exhausted them, leaving you simultaneously desperate for more but buzzing over the limited time spent in that world.