Monument Valley 2+ made the jump onto Apple Arcade Friday. Gameplay involves “a journey through magical architecture, discovering illusionary pathways and delightful puzzles as you learn the secrets of the Sacred Geometry,” according to the developer, Ustwo Games.
The puzzle adventure is “an immersive, addictive experience,” according to the Cult of Mac review.
Head off with a little girl as she wanders a Mediterranean island rescuing animals in Alba: A Wildlife Adventure. She’s supposed to be on vacation, but she’s ready to start an environmental movement instead!
The game, which hit Apple Arcade on Friday, is from Ustwo Games, the creator of the classic Monument Valley.
Monument Valley was such a huge hit that any follow up offerings from Ustwo Games alway draw attention. On Monday, the company unveiled Alba: a Wildlife Adventure via a teaser video trailer.
Watch it now:
What do you do as a second act after creating one of the most beautiful iOS games in history? If you’re Ustwo, the devs behind the Cult of Mac favorite Monument Valley, the answer is simple: you redesign the car dashboard.
Yes, you read that correctly.
It might be a long way from the M.C. Escher-inspired iPad puzzle game, but Ustwo has teamed up with the company Car Design Research to create a prototype for a simplified in-car display that shows only the information you need at the time you need it. And, unsurprisingly, it looks spectacular.
One of the biggest reasons why many app developers continue to snub Android is piracy. The platform’s “open” approach, which allows applications to be downloaded from third-party sources and installed manually, makes it incredibly easy for users to circumvent Google Play and obtain paid apps completely free.
Piracy on Android is so rampant right now that just 5 percent of installs of Monument Valley — one of the best mobile games of 2014, which is currently priced at $3.99 in the Play Store — have actually been paid for.
Monument Valley is my pick for iOS game of the year; a twisting, gorgeous, MC Escher-style puzzler that’s spellbinding from start to finish. And given that it has received upwards of 1 million downloads, I’m far from alone in thinking that way.
Which is why it’s great to hear that the game is set to receive its first expansion on November 13. Titled “Forgotten Shores,” the expansion will plunge players back into the world of Princess Ida, as she travels through eight entirely new levels, with a slew of fresh puzzles to solve on her journey.
Monument Valley is one of the most original iOS games ever. A triumph of isometric design, it’s a trippy puzzle game in which you guide a white-clad princess through a series of twisting, turning structures, inspired by the mind-bending art of M.C. Escher.
Creating a world of this complexity might sound like a nightmare project, but for the UK-based game developers at ustwo, coming up with such an audacious creation was something of a dream.
“One of the first things we did when designing Monument Valley were to try and come up with images that seemed impossible,” says lead designer Ken Wong.
Still reeling from the success of the game — priced at $3.99, it was the top paid iPad app in its first week of release — Wong cracked open his sketchbooks to give Cult of Mac readers a glimpse at how Monument Valley‘s breathtaking designs came to be.
Here’s what we found.
Princess Ida needs to find herself, and she’s doing so with a quest across an unpredictable and shifting landscape that takes inspiration from perspective-bending Escher art and hit indie game Fez.
You’ll need to tap on the screen to get Ida moving to her end goal, swiping and rotating dozens of different mechanical gadgets to make sure she can continue on her way. The puzzles aren’t super difficult, but they do require a bit of thought, and plenty of them are downright ingenious. You’ll feel pretty darn intelligent when you finally get that “aha!” moment.
Check out our play-through video below to get a sense of how lush and calming Monument Valley really is.
Whale Trail and Blip Blup developer Ustwo released a new trailer for its upcoming game Monument Valley, a stunningly beautiful game that looks to be influenced by the art of MC Escher, with gameplay that seems similar to hit indie game, Fez.
Aside from those obvious comparisons, what the trailer and accompanying screenshots show is a mind- and perspective-bending gameplay trip through various and brightly-colored worlds, guiding the silent princess protagonist through crazy architectural geometries.
Designer Ken Wong calls it “a beautiful, exploratory experience, somewhere between exploring a toy shop and reading The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe.”
