Armikrog is a unique stop motion clay animated point and click adventure game from the creators of Earthworm Jim and the Neverhood. Unravel the mysteries of the fortress that holds Tommynaut and his blind alien talking dog Beak-Beak captive through exploration and puzzle solving...

I really wanted to like Armikrog. I love classic claymation shows like Trap Door and the Wallace & Gromit movies, and the cut sequences to this game are a lot of fun.

Once you settle down to the gameplay, you soon realise this can become a little old a little too quickly. The main issue is that this title was originally a point and click game for the PC where, with the aid of a mouse, you could click anywhere you thought might have an action point.

Released for the Xbox One this element becomes much more time consuming. In fact, I have to admit that as much as I really loved the look of the game, and I really wanted to progress to the next cut sequence, I actually got bored very quickly. In fact I had to put it aside and then go online to watch a walk through video to see how to progress past a certain point. And even then I shook my head at some of the bizarre logic that developers used. I couldn't help feeling it was deliberately designed to be extremely hard in a bid to pad out the game.

In places it reminded me of the old classic laser arcade game Dragon's Lair, in that the actually gameplay was rather tedious, with the fun coming from the cool cell animation.

If you think that Tommynaut looks a little familiar, it's because the characters are the creation of Doug TenNapel, who brought us Earthworm Jim.

The animation and the look and the feel of the game are first class. In addition the music (by Terry Scott Taylor) and vocal acting is of a very high standard. Behind the voices are Jon Heder (Napoleon Dynamite), Rob Paulsen (Pinky and the Brain) and Michael J. Nelson (Mystery Science Theater 3000).

If you love claymation then you'll probably enjoy this. Likewise if you're a fan of complex puzzle games, with their own bizarre logic, you will also find this momentarily entertaining. Sadly, I can't help thinking that this game could have been a lot better executed and a lot more fun.

6

Nick Smithson