Released a few months ago, Aarik and the Ruined Kingdom is a delightful puzzle-platformer that asks only one thing of its player…get to the exit. Presented as a series of 3D rotatable worlds, not unlike LEGO Builder’s Journey, you will need to guide Aarik around the kingdom, exploring castles, forests, deserts, and other fun environments, as you try to manipulate the world and repair the kingdom, but mostly escape each area and advance to the next.
Perspective plays a huge role in solving many of the puzzles in the Ruined Kingdom, and you have the ability to rotate the world and view your surroundings from numerous fixed angles. Depending on your viewing angle, broken paths and bridges can miraculously be made whole based entirely on your perspective. Later in the game you will get to move parts of the architecture to repair structures and create your own path to the exit. You’ll get to interact with buttons and switches that raise and lower or rotate sections of the world, and in some scenarios, you will get to interact and save other citizens of the kingdom and even manipulate time itself.
Aarik and the Ruined Kingdom delivers some quality puzzle-solving action that scales nicely in complexity to match your knowledge of how the game actually works. As you unlock new abilities the puzzles will adapt to make use of and test those abilities in creative ways. There are plenty of hidden secrets including a gold crown sticker hidden in each level that you only need to click on to collect; a nice way for the player to directly interact with the world without using Aarik. The graphics are totally charming, colorful, and vibrant with fun animations and great lighting and particle effects to create a magical fantasy vibe.
The soundtrack is excellent with some relaxing strings and keyboard music that slips into the background, but I do wish there was a bit more because it does start to get repetitive after an hour or so. Controls are excellent whether you are using a gamepad for direct control or a mouse to point and click your way around the level, and the low system requirements means just about anyone with a working PC can play this game. This would be a perfect fit for portable gaming like a Steam Deck.
You’ll find several hours of fun waiting in the six wonderful worlds of Aarik and the Ruined Kingdom, more than enough fun to justify the $8 entry fee. The game is family friendly and will certainly help younger gamers learn situational awareness and shifting perspectives. The menus are easy to navigate and there is a nice level select screen that shows which levels still have hidden crowns to find. Aside from finding missing crowns there is little reason to replay once you have finished, but Aarik will give you a fun ride for your time and money if you are up to the challenge of saving yet another kingdom headed toward ruin.
