Colt: 8
A Pelican man in a bowler hat and frisky birthday globs fend off the rising tide: winner. Blueberry Garden’s gimmick is an open-world free-form journey, where the player is free to fly the sparse environment and interact with the objects therein, set to a wonderful soundtrack by Daduk. The aspect of discovery, transformation and “I can do that?” creates an excellent first impression, but my experience tapered off soon after from a combination of flying nausea and an irritable hardware compatibility. The joy of creation and freedom to explore is sustainable enough, but maybe I’m not cut out for High Art. Moving around rocks and red balls is fun, but sometimes I just want to rescue a princess. Still, Blueberry Garden is a breakaway hit, creating a wonderful environment where ultimately it rests on the player to create the adventure.

Ben: 6
Surrealistic, high-concept games like Blueberry Garden have flooded the independent game landscape in the past few years, and Blueberry Garden’s pitfalls are all too familiar; lots of surrealism means scant gameplay. Players guide the game’s protagonist through a garden to collect very large, inanimate objects using the aid of various power-granting edibles. Unfortunately, the puzzles protecting the objects are painfully obvious, with the necessary fruit almost always positioned right beside the object. The sense of exploration is exciting at first, but quickly dies when you catch on to the game’s pattern. The most interesting aspect of Blueberry Garden is the large objects, which stack at the game’s starting point as you collect them, and allow your character to glide higher and higher as you collect them. The burning question of “What is this tower going to become? “ is almost enough to compel players to ignore the overly-simplified gameplay. Blueberry Garden would have been much better as a free Flash game, but as it stands isn’t worth the admission price.

Mike: 8
Erik Svedang’s Blueberry Garden was this year’s IGF grand prize winner. I had several problems running and enjoying Blueberry Garden. Despite the game’s simplistic graphics, I had framerate issues and crashing problems (-1 pt). However, once I overcame the technical and delved into Blueberry Garden, I fell in love with the overall style of the game. The game is an open platformer which allows you to explore and interact in the garden at your own pace. AS you interact with fruits and objects in the world, you’ll unlock new areas to explore. The gameplay is a little mellow with no enemies and only a small amount to explore. This game wasn’t meant to be delivered in demo form. The full version is only $5 and can be completed in a couple hours. If you like the uniqueness of the demo, it’s a no-brainer purchase.

Kayla: 9
Blueberry Garden is pure, inspirational, artistic genius, but makes no pretentious claim to be so. It exposes the lackluster attempts that many main-stream production teams have when creating a platforming game and proves that there is still much, much more to offer the general public. Blueberry Garden is set in a wonderfully creative environment that promotes discovery and exploration. The music and sounds within the game are lovely. Everything has a subtle, yet fitting sound attached to it…but that’s not the best thing. The piano…oh, the piano! It’s always a background piece as you play, but it adds even more character to the game when it suddenly kicks in as you fly throughout your world, making the experience entirely different from flying in any other game. I bought this game, but was sorely disappointed when I played through it twice in one hour. It’s small and sweet, like a blueberry, I suppose, but I have to say that it could be a detrimental factor when some consider buying it. That, and the instability that the game seems to have when downloading. It’s entirely deserving of the awards it’s won, and it’s also a must-try. Be sure NOT to miss out.

Average: 7.75

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