Woven

Woven could have been a welcome addition to the family friendly game catalogue, but the finished game just lacks any kind of polish or fun. The controls are unresponsive, the design decisions at odds with the presumed audience, and the few moments of interest lost in a sea of mediocrity and meandering backtracking. Unfortunately, Woven is just knit very good.

Much as I wanted to love Woven, I left the experience quite disappointed. There was promise here, but for whatever reason it wasn’t met. If you don’t mind clumsy physics and very complex and vague puzzles, you might enjoy what’s here. Even then, it’s a hard pill to swallow at $19.99. Though you can beat the game in less than 5 hours, it took me around 9 due to getting lost repeatedly. So at least you’ll get some bang for your buck. This is one of those games I recommend you pick up on a sale. Hopefully Alterego Games has more ideas they can breathe life into in the future, cause I’d honestly like to see them succeed. In the meantime, I’ll lament this tale of an elephant and his firefly buddy.

Woven is a sedate, easy to play, colorful, game that's imaginative and pleasant to look at. However, it starts slowly and doesn't get much faster, and it requires a healthy chill level on the player's part.

It is perfect for all ages and even more so to enjoy over the holidays.

Woven is not a fun game, but it's certainly a nice story. There are concepts —particularly the body-swapping mechanic— that could have been enjoyable with the right execution, but this game doesn't even come close to pulling them off.

You start out with an old, rough looking Stuffy, who for now is stuffed, and sewn together to look like an Elephant. What a perfect first animal to pick to start off the adventure. Appealing to kids and adults alike, he is a little faded and limping on one leg.

Woven is obviously a game aimed at children, something rare nowadays. Analyzing it from this perspective, its visual and narrative characteristics are very appropriate, although it may become repetitive and even sleepy for other audiences. It has great creative ideas, but makes some technical slips away from excellence. But it has many merits and certainly deserves attention.

Woven is a game which wants you to take your time and explore the bright, colourful environments whilst solving puzzles. The combination of standard puzzles and environmental ones, which requires you to build your own FrankenStuffy, are a great balance and really get you thinking about your appearance as well as your inherited abilities. Woven doesn’t hold your hand and point you in the right direction like almost every other exploration-based game today, you must explore and uncover the secrets with little to no help. Although looking very child-friendly, especially with the brilliantly rhyming narration, I feel some younger kids may require support and guidance from an adult with certain puzzles due to the hands-off approach the game delivers.

Most modern games tend to feature protagonists who are ready for action and tough as nails...

Woven provides a pleasant experience with a nicely narrated story that will be very well suited to young children. While the technical issues are likely to go unnoticed by the target audience, they are enough to ruin the experience for anyone who plays games regularly. There isn’t much here that the average gamer would find enjoyable. With that being said, for parents looking for a game to introduce their children into gaming, you couldn’t find a better game than this.