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It begins without fanfare; a list of computer commands projected against a sea of cloud. There's no cut-scene or plotting, nor the slightest indication of the brilliance to come. Instead, your robot avatar is shown a simple garden and bid seek a temple by the booming voice of a supposed god. In short order, you grasp the necessity of spatial reasoning through the first-person perspective, then the binary function of electrical jammers that disable barriers and lethal security systems. No formal tutorial is offered and none is required; like a child with a set of building blocks you learn through play.Slowly, it escalates, layering new puzzle elements atop the old and unveiling a loose thread of narrative to pick at that hints at some long-past extinction event and grapples with the frailty of the human condition. It's soon apparent that this first-person philosophical puzzler represents quite the departure for the team responsible for the bombastic Serious Sam franchise.
The individual puzzle elements of The Talos Principle are clean and uncomplicated. Alongside its jamming devices are connectors that link laser beam power-sources to conduits in order to open doors and power a handful of electrical tools. Blocks act as weights for switches, or as steps, disruptors or floating platforms and there's a clever holographic recording device that comes into play later on. Like its tools, the puzzles avoid becoming obtuse or fussy, with Croteam instead trusting to the layering effect to provide a series of challenges whose complexity comes colour-coded and clear of clutter.
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