The PAX 10: Plane Weaver

I can hardly get my friends to agree on what to put on a pizza let alone create a game in the span of a month. Plane Weaver is a rather clever student project that comes to us from Denmark. In this platform-puzzlier, you must save your brother’s soul from a giant machine bent on taking over the world. 

Lucky for him, he happens to have a sister who can switch planes of existence to become a demon that can manipulate objects or a spirit that can ride on air currents. Along with being in your natural state of a rather athletic female, you must traverse the machine to break out bits and pieces of your brother’s soul. Gameplay focuses on using all three states in order to solve problems. In one instance, I needed to change into the demon to freeze a swiveling steam spout and switch to my spirit form to ride the air current to my next destination. The game is much less about “where” and more about “how the hell do I get there?”

While it may still have a few faults, the look and design of the game is particularly well done. Besides the massive gears and platforms you’ll need to cross, the inner workings of the machine loom all around you and drop into a darkening void. The developers did an amazing job of making you feel small against this vast background. You’ll pull gears, slide across airstreams, and frantically climb for your life as you encounter more bits and pieces of the mechanical monstrosity.

Of course, you could always judge the game for yourself, especially since this PC-based title is playable for free on the university website.