*=Video
^=Music
All Caps=Recommended
Hover mouse over screenshots for commentary.
August 2014
 |  |  Your bedroom. |
|---|---|---|
 Jumping around town. |  Someone's house. |  Me too, woman. Me too. |
 |  The old man has just described Cognitive Theory! |  I am rarely given this compliment. |
 The cube is coming! |  Ahhh! |  The giant cube! Bestower of the fez! |
 |  Behold, what comes from above? |  The Fez! |
 Shazam! |  Something's gone wrong. |  I don't know if this is a clever game mechanic or a reference to the fact that Fez crashed the first time Phil Fish allowed the public to play it. Either way, pretty cool. |
 |  Huh, that same room as before. I wonder what would happen if I rotated the room? |  Boom! A treasure chest! |
 |  You find treasure maps that provide clues to particularly obscure puzzles. |  Yes, Navi? |
 |  |  |
 |  There isn't normally swimming like this - I just took off to the left to see what would happen. Nothing. |  I got enough cube pieces to form a bigger cube! |
 |  You can tell there is an invisible platform there because the rain splashes on it. |  |
 A warp gate. |  |  |
 |  Believe it or not, those Tetris-like constellations are actually Fezian symbols telling you a code. |  Ooh! A cube piece! |
 Throne? |  |  |
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 The map screen. A hexagon will turn gold if you have discovered everything on that screen. |  This is cryptic - An "anti-cube" will appear when any hand is at the top of the clock. One reaches the top every minute, one every hour, one every day, and one every week. Get ready to change the clock on your PS4! |  |
 A treasure map I found helped me to figure out how to get up to this treasure chest. |  |  |
 |  |  |
 |  |  |
 This is an anti-cube. There are 32 of them to find. |  |  |
 One screen appears to be glitching out. |  |  Front view. . . |
 Side view. |  |  |
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 I've found them all!!! |  Zoom out, phase 1. |  Zoom out, phase 2. |
 Zoom out, phase 3. |  Zoom out, phase 1. |  Zoom out, phase 2. |
 Zoom out, phase 3. |  |  |
 Ooh! The mythical 3D glasses! |  If you have a capable TV, you can now play with the 3D mode enabled. |  Me proving I've aced the map. |
 |  My completion rate (see my intro to the game for more info). |  When you have completed the game, you gain the ability to see the world as it actually is, in 3D. This is needed to solve certain puzzles. |
Fez
Fez is on a bunch of systems, but I played it on the PS4. It's a 2D platformer, like Mario, where you try to collect pieces of a giant cube across a variety of levels.
But, actually, it's not really 2D. You see, your character receives a mystical fez from a giant cube. The fez grants you the ability to turn the environment 90 degrees. So, even though the game surface you play on appears 2D, it is actually 3D. Anything in the environment has to fit onto the 2D plane, so you can reach previously unreachable areas simply by shifting the environment 90 degrees. Unfortunately it's hard to explain in screenshots!
The game itself is quite clever and doesn't rely on using the same exact "puzzle" over and over. In fact, many of the puzzles in Fez are quite obscure. The guy who made the game, Phil Fish, actually created an entire "Fezian" language, including a number system. Some cube pieces can only be obtained by following instructions given in a made-up language! Even though some puzzles are cryptic, they are possible to discover. However, many people suspect that all of Fez's secrets have yet to be uncovered even though it's been out for over 5 years. The highest known completion rate is 209.4%.
I really enjoyed the cryptic puzzles because it reminded me of games from my childhood that seemed impossible to solve without the aid of several friends or a magazine article. I really enjoyed the overall game. It is lovingly made and designed well. I think there's plenty to enjoy for either a serious gamer or a more casual one.