Maquette Reviews
For a puzzle game exploring altered perspectives within its mechanics and themes on a grand scale, Grateful Decay's debut can be considered a limited success.
Maquette is a short, impactful experience. Through clever use of its puzzle mechanics, it forces you to think in ways only the best of the genre tend to do. While the story and writing aren’t as good as the other parts of the title it is still an easy recommendation for anyone to check out for a night or two through Game Pass.
Maquette is a brilliant yet short adventure that is well worth a visit if you have Game Pass. Great story through strong visuals, great voice acting, music, and some good puzzle mechanics delivers a great package of emotions.
A mix of lush and gorgeous visuals, some unique puzzle elements, and a pretty well-voiced story of love
“You cannot change the past, but you can always change your perspective”. It’s a quote that feels fitting for Maquette, both with its gameplay and its narrative. The puzzler from developer Graceful Decay doesn’t just give players a myriad of challenging enigmas to solve that requires them to use different perspectives to alter the objects around them, but it also tells a love story that’s somewhat bittersweet. That’s not a spoiler, by the way, but something that’s addressed in the intro.
Maquette is definitely not perfect. However, its very special concept, its wonderful aesthetic and some inspiring moments, were enough to keep me until the end and give it an interesting personality.
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Maquette is a beautiful, artistic puzzle game waiting to tell a story. The concept is good, but the implementation leaves a lot to be desired. At times, it can have glitches and feel a little clunky, but if you can overlook that, you might find Maquette's story is just what you need.
As a debut game, Maquette has really set the bar high for the future Graceful Decay. Between the emotional story, challenging and creative puzzles and the beautiful visual style, this game is a great showcase of the talent that lives within this development team. Maquette is a refreshing entry to the first-person puzzle genre that will provide you with more than a few challenging moments and a memorable experience.
While its romantic sob story feels a bit boilerplate and it doesn’t fully commit to some of its most intriguing gameplay ideas, Maquette is a short, sincere game that captures the puzzling road to closure in the wake of a messy break-up.
I want to love Maquette. It’s is a solid puzzle game whose moments of brilliance are regularly interrupted by stumbles and rough spots. It soars much more often than it dips, but there are enough times where things don’t land that the experience can feel disruptive. While some extra time to polish some of the rough edges would have been majorly beneficial, it’s still a wholly unique piece that merits your time and attention. Just know going in that it’s imperfect, as all of us are, and try not to let those little details get under your skin.
The story is one that we’ve all seen before, but the performances from Bryce Dallas Howard and Seth Gabel make it easier to get attached to. Most of the puzzles are beyond easy, but this is a game that’s more about the journey than about stretching your mind muscles. Some might think this game is too short, taking only about three to four hours to complete, but I think its length was perfect.
Maquette is a beautiful game with a compelling narrative that is a perfect weekend experience. Across its four-hour runtime, I was able to feel emotionally invested in this relationship as I begged to see it through until the end. The puzzles hinder progression, but the lack of interaction with the environment limits any additional playthroughs or unique playing experiences.
It’s touching, and the puzzle side keeps you engaged while your heartstrings are being tugged.