Everyone loves a good puzzle game and when the puzzle game is accompanied by a beautiful visual style, mind-bending puzzles, and a soothing soundtrack, it quickly becomes a solid addition to anyone’s gaming collection. Meet me at Noon is one such puzzle game, developed and published by Pandaroo Interactive which brings its own unique twist to the puzzle genre and quickly engages every last brain cell in your head for solving its complex puzzles that blend platforming and time manipulation with each other. This is our review of Meet me at Noon in which we turn the day into night and night into day by solving puzzles.
In Meet me at Noon, the Grand Hourglass has broken, and the concept of night and day has broken because of it. After breaking into two parts, the Grand Hourglass has broken into two different spirits where one spirit controls the daytime and is represented by the sun and the other spirit controls the nighttime and is represented by nighttime. They are also called the Twin Spirits. In the game, you take control of these two spirits, and you must solve different puzzles in order to form the full circle of the day. One of the spirits can only move during the daytime while the other one can only move during the nighttime. Your goal is to make sure that both of the spirits reach their designated icons at the same time after traversing through progressively difficult levels.
The game is played out in the form of a timeline where you have to complete a certain amount of turns with one of the spirits and then complete a certain amount of turns with the second spirit. Both of them walk normally while you are controlling them. However, their actions are recorded and each of them behaves in a different way once the time loop is rewound or fast-forwarded. The daytime spirit will rewind its actions when you are controlling the nighttime spirit and the nighttime spirit will replay its action when you are controlling the daytime spirit. Using this unique time loop mechanic, you must solve different puzzles and at the end of the puzzle, make sure that the daytime spirit lands on the sun while the nighttime spirit lands on the moon. The number of available moves for each spirit is displayed at the bottom of each screen.
This unique mechanic means that sometimes you will have to waste some moves in order to complete a level as well however it all depends on the active puzzle. You cannot control the other spirit before you complete all of the allocated moves of the current spirit in your control. Based on their time loop behavior, once you take control of the other spirit, they will act accordingly, and you have to make moves that will help the current spirit in reaching its designated icon at the end of the level. This means that sometimes you will be supporting the other spirits by helping them make jumps, forming platforms by one of the spirits, and more similar acts in order to solve the puzzles. As you progress in the game, the puzzles will start getting harder and harder.
You start the game with basic puzzles where one spirit is only controlled once and you have to solve the puzzle however as you progress, the moves for both spirits start appearing more than once in the same level and you have to find out the solutions to the puzzles by utilizing them all in the right way. There are no shortcuts or hints here apart from an in-game tutorial which is all about detailing mechanics and not helping out with individual puzzles. I have been playing puzzle games for a long time and Meet me at Noon is a tough one to solve at various places.
Right from the start of the game, the game hooks you in with its unique gameplay mechanics and you really just sit there for a long time trying to solve just ‘one more puzzle’. While it is not really about the narrative or the story, you get 10 worlds filled with varying numbers of puzzles to solve. You start off easily, however, the later levels are really challenging especially if you are not used to how puzzle games work. There is no time rush and you are free to undo and redo to play around with different things in order to solve the puzzles. There are minimalistic loading screens as well which is a sign of an excellent puzzle game since it keeps you in the puzzle rather than loading screens.
Another great aspect of Meet me at Noon is its brilliant art style and the soundtrack that accompanies it. The game is really soothing to play and since there are no time limits to bother you as well, you can just sit there listening to an amazing soundtrack as you try to solve various puzzles. The art style and animations are silky smooth and the transitions from one level to another feel really cool as well. The game certainly does not disappoint when it comes to visuals and soundtrack. Apart from this, it is free of any sort of technical bugs as well and during my playthrough for this review, I do not remember any sort of visual or game-breaking bug in the game showing that the developer has done a good job in optimizing the game.
Final Verdict:
Meet me at Noon is a visually pleasing puzzle game with an equally soothing soundtrack. While it may look pretty, the puzzles in the game are not that easy and they will really tease your mind. The concept of the game is brilliant and just when you think that no new puzzle game will come up with a unique idea, Meet me at Noon brings its own take on a cool puzzle mechanic. If you love a good mind-bender, Meet me at Noon is surely going to give you one with its solid puzzle-solving with no time constraints, beautiful visuals, and an equally good soundtrack playing in the background. Must-play for fans of puzzle games.
Final Score: 8.0/10
