The Pini Society: The Remarkable Truth
Score: 85% ESRB: Not Rated Publisher: Arkadium Developer: Arkadium Media: Download/1 Players: 1 (Online Leaderboards) Genre: Puzzle/ Edutainment/ Themed
Graphics & Sound: When you first pop in (or download, rather) The Pini Society, you're treated to an opening sequence that puts intrigue in your heart through a series of images and audio that come in the form of an overview video. This is a small taste of the components of the game, and is a welcome surprise from a casual game like this. The menus and between-game maps, books, and other visual elements are also very well realized and help keep with the archeological form of the game. The audio during some of these cut-scenes, if you will, is also done very well and in a way that keeps you interested, as does the Egyptian-style background music. In-game elements also come through with flying colors... literally. The different tile pieces that make up the puzzles are very distinguishable and most of the screen elements are as well. The only problem was that sometimes the white pieces didn't have enough contrast with the background, but that flaw is likely a combination of the screen elements and the monitor I'm playing from. The in-game audio is also very professional and helps keep the intensity as you beat the buzzer.
Gameplay: As mentioned above, The Pini Society is a puzzle game disguised as an informational piece about a certain secret society... or is it the other way around? The Pini Society is definitely geared toward the casual gamer and is a great way to learn historical information about The Pini Society, while at the same time enjoying a great tile-based puzzler along the way. The game's structure is set up in a way that the presentation of the society's information is interrupted by the puzzle games, which get increasingly harder and harder. In those games, you'll be presented with different sized tiles, in shapes anywhere from basic squares and triangles to rhomboids and parallelograms. With those shapes, you'll have to fill in the board to uncover the secrets of the The Pini Society. The big gameplay elements that set this puzzler apart from the rest of the pack lie in the Power Symbols and the Work Area. Since you can basically solve each puzzle by either placing all of the tiles or by overcoming its Goal Score, you'll have to find a balance between placing tiles quickly or setting yourself up for bigger scores. The Work Area is just that, a smaller-sized area where you can place tiles temporarily, aligning them together so that you can then place multiple tiles at once for bigger scores. Without this technique, you won't stand a change after the first few puzzles. In conjunction with the Work Area, you'll often need to place certain tiles together in the Work Area, and then place them all at once on the main board to gain the bonus points from Power Symbols. These specials will help you gain points exponentially, and are a must to successfully find out more about The Pini Society. As you're playing, you'll also be able to lock in specials that can help you out by showing you where to place pieces, where the Power Symbols are, or even place extra pieces for you every time you drop one/some. There are also bonus puzzles available, intertwined by the story, and the ability to sync up to the Internet for the Online Leaderboards. While the story generally has nothing to do with the puzzles that are put before you, The Pini Society does a great job of simultaneously entertaining and informing. This game is, after all, a specialized form of edutainment (Shhh... don't tell your kids!).
Difficulty: The Pini Society is meant for casual gamers, but certainly can appeal to hard-core gamers who enjoy a good puzzle game. The gameplay allows for anyone to pick it up and play, but those who don't game will certainly struggle after only a few puzzles are completed. In fact, even those game-savvy individuals out there will likely be almost to the point of frustration because of the difficulty that lies within each puzzle. It's not that learning how to play is that difficult... in fact, The Pini Society is very repetitive and thus, after the tutorials are completed, you'll know how to solve each and every puzzle. Instead, it's that the puzzles get increasingly more difficult and without the use of good "thinking ahead" skills and utilizing the Work Area, you won't be able to further the storyline, which can also cause frustration. But the rewards are definitely worth it as you explore different continents and retrace the steps of the members of The Pini Society, and the feeling of accomplishment far exceeds the frustration that traveled with you to the goal.
Game Mechanics: As far as controls go, it can't get a whole lot easier than what The Pini Society presents you with. You'll have your choice to rotate pieces with the Right Mouse Button or the Spacebar, and placing pieces is as simple as single- or double-clicking with the Left Mouse Button. The only problem that I had with controls (and gameplay in general) was that the directions were sometimes unclear, and either took a good re-reading or in some cases, trial and error, to figure out what to do. Once you do understand, however, the controlling scheme is as basic as it can be. The Pini Society can easily suck you in, in terms of both gameplay and story. If you are at all interested in puzzle games, secret societies, or even the history of artifacts, then this game is for you. The best part is that anyone can play, as The Pini Society is set up for the casual gamer to be able to pick up and play for five minutes, if you so choose. But I doubt that will ever be the case. The addiction of either (or both) the story or the puzzles will certainly keep you there long past saying "just one last game."
-Woody, GameVortex Communications AKA Shane Wodele
Minimum System Requirements: Windows 2000/NT/XP/Vista; 512MB RAM; 150MB Hard Drive Space; 1.2 GHz Processor; Internet Connection (for Global High Score Board)   Test System: AMD Turion 64 X2 Mobile Technology TL-52; 1.61GHz (Dual) Processors; 960MB RAM; NVIDIA GeForce Go 6150 Integrated Graphics
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