(This review hardly contains any spoiler, but you should play the game before reading anything.)
Virtues
- Unprecedented, very creative puzzle mechanics and overall design that obey rules waiting to be unveiled. Antichamber is like a metroidvania, where your knowledge is part of the requirements to unlock new areas.
- The maze has a mind-bending layout, but you explore it freely. The anticipated gun upgrades can sometimes be accessed from multiple paths.
- Many “rooms” have several “exits” — which lead to dead ends, connect to far away locations, or open new paths. No outcome is meaningless, as they are all featured on the map.
- The game plays with your expectations and displays, on your first “failures” and “successes”, surprisingly authentic aphorisms matching your last actions.
- Should you get stuck, you are to blame, because the knowledge needed to advance is solely acquired through hypothesis and observations. A smile should appear on your face once you realize what you overlooked.
- A 3D puzzle platformer is always better with gun-like tools, especially when they receive upgrades!
- Right from the start, the game makes it quite obvious that no story is to be expected (more obvious than, say, The Witness), so that you won’t get disappointed at the end of the journey.
- Great potential for speedrunning. The game thread on SpeedDemosArchive is like an enthralling novel filled with plot twists.
- Technically flawless, as far as I can tell.
Flaws
- There is a recurrent element seen in hidden places, with actually no purpose, which can be misleading.