Unravel Reviews
This year's most beautiful game so far, Unravel doesn't quite display the design prowess to match its wonderful visuals, but it's nevertheless an enjoyable, charming experience. And in Yarny, EA has an adorable new mascot.
Unravel succeeds by coupling together a thoughtful, moving story with challenging platforming scenarios and a gorgeous presentation that brings out the best from EA's "indie" side. It may leave you stuck in a few places, but this is one of those games that certainly won't, ahem, string you along.
Unravel wowed us when it was first announced and its safe to save the loving man of yarn has brought a heartfelt story to the next gen. While its puzzles slowly lose and sense of challenge, the stunning environments more than make up for it.
Cloying adorability is Unravel's saving grace. Propped up on a crutch constructed from mawkish sentimentality, it gets away with a fair few missteps and manages to claw together a smattering of memorable moments. This pretty shell, however, is undeniably a shell, and no amount of pretty little animations can make up for a total drought of engaging game design.
Oozing charm and sentimentality, it won't just pull at your heartstrings, it'll tie them up in great big wooly knots, attach them to a boulder and drop them off the edge of a cliff.
That being said, fans of great visuals, physics-based puzzles and cute characters can overlook the game's ‘basis’ and jump in and enjoy a game that truly delivers in its core elements.
If Unravel gains strength from its single-mindedness, it also never succeeds at becoming more than what it seems: a modest, melancholic but ultimately heartwarming effort.
A simple, emotional journey that is also simple to play, Unravel works at endearing you despite the mundane mechanics behind the journey.
Yarny heads a fantastic 2D platformer that suffers from one or two issues, but ultimately becomes one of the more enjoyable experiences in recent memory. The music is peaceful, challenges are introduced intelligently, and the visual design is stunning. Unravel is an absolute delight of a video game.
Unravel is a unique piece of art in a gaming world filled with first-person shooters and epic AAA titles. It's not perfect, but it does a great job challenging one's brain, while delivering some visually stunning scenery to make you forget you're working hard to progress and push through. Certainly a must-have for 2016.
Unravel is pure charm from start to finish. It's not going to redefine the platformer genre, but it's a wonderfully atmospheric and enjoyable title with solid gameplay and delightful visuals. Sometimes, a heartfelt game is enough to make you smile. A short length and some annoying quibbles detract a bit from the experience, but it never lingers on any one idea for too long. Yarny is one of the most adorable game characters, and his adventure is certainly worth experiencing for gamers of all ages.
Unravel is a fleeting yet enjoyable experience, with great gameplay and production design. Experienced players may find it too easy, but it's a gorgeous blend of story and gameplay for everyone else.
Despite all of its cutesy posturing and promises, Unravel is still looking to fill some kind of void. And I'm not sure if that void is its shortcomings as a mood board, as a videogame, or a cloying digestible basket of "feels" for EA.
Unravel is a romantic and funny platform game in which emotions and beauty are tied tight with simplicity.
Review in Italian | Read full review
The iffy puzzles and tedious backtracking in Unravel sadly cannot be fixed by switching to an easy mode as the game doesn't offer any kind of "just play the story" mode. That's a shame since the world and likability of the lead hero make the kind of adventure I love to get lost in. The price of $19.99 is fair for a campaign that lasts just under seven hours and, if you want to get all the collectibles, can probably go up to ten. I'm not giving up on Unravel, though. I think with better controls, fairer puzzles, and more leniency with the string allotment, Unravel 2: Enter the House Cat could be a real winner.
… Unravel doesn't miss a step. A wonder to play, a joy to experience, a feast for the senses and a heartfelt story told by a team of passionate developers.
Unravel packs a challenge within its beautiful backdrop
Unravel is a game that everyone should experience. It will pull you in from the moment you enter to the moment you have to let it go.
From the moment that little ball of red yarn tumbled down the old woman's steps to the last bit of yarn that I strung from place to place in the old woman's memories, I enjoyed almost every step, swing, and catapult. The emotive little Yarny had me feeling for him as I traversed the dangerous terrain with his ever unraveling figure. Though the gameplay falls victim to ebbs and flows of being too frustrating at times and too easy at others, it was still an overall enjoyable experience. Like the fading memories of the old woman, it may not stick around in your immediate cognizance, but taking this expedition with Yarny over a weekend afternoon will certainly make an imprint on your heart.
Unravel took me on a surprisingly thoughtful and reflective journey, which encouraged me to appreciate the small and the insignificant with every step. As a puzzler it has charm due to Yarny's engaging skills, but as a platforming experience it's less remarkable. But to judge it solely on these mechanical aspects would be to overlook its greater achievement: the way it provokes subtle and complex emotions through the use of nature and nostalgia. It all makes for a sincere, warm-hearted, and extremely likeable adventure.