Game Reviews

ARise AR review - It's all about perspective in this AR puzzler

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iOS
| ARise
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ARise AR review - It's all about perspective in this AR puzzler
|
iOS
| ARise

ARise is definitely an interesting prospect. It's a puzzling platformer that sees you moving around a floating world, connecting it so your little character can scamper forwards.

Think Monument Valley or Fez, but you're physically strutting around a room, pointing your camera in such a way to join together apparently separate blocks.

It's not the most comfortable experience, and you are going to need a lot of room to play it. But it's still worth a look.

Float down here

The basic idea of the game is a simple one. You need to change the perspective that you're viewing a level from in order to slot blocks together. When they're connected, you move to the next puzzle.

Because you're using your camera, you need to find the right angle by walking around, changing the angle of your device, and slipping the pieces into place.

Like I say, it's simple, but it's very smart. You're turning an Escher painting into a functioning landscape just by moving around. And there's a pleasant hum when you solve a tricky challenge.

Sometimes getting the initial settings right can be a little problematic though, and you'll need to reset a couple of times to make sure that everything is working the way it should.

And because of the physicality inherent in making your way around the level, you're going to need a pretty large clear space to get the most out of ARise.

It's definitely worth persevering with though, because once things do start working properly you're going to be having a lovely old time.

Arise sir AR

ARise is certainly an interesting implementation of the ARKit. It doesn't quite manage to live up to its potential though, and that's a bit of a shame.

Still, in spite of the niggles there's a lot to like here. And if you prefer your games a little more thoughtful then it's well worth checking out.

ARise AR review - It's all about perspective in this AR puzzler

There's definitely a good idea here, but you need to scrape through some problems to find it
Score
Harry Slater
Harry Slater
Harry used to be really good at Snake on the Nokia 5110. Apparently though, digital snake wrangling isn't a proper job, so now he writes words about games instead.