A quirky little game with an intriguing premise and little in the way of story

Nov 21, 2012 15:36 GMT  ·  By

Little Inferno has a pedigree, as the next game from the team that delivered the physics and cuteness heavy World of Goo. But those expecting another puzzle-like experience will get something entirely different, a game where everything burns and it’s not clear what compulsion drives players to keep giving items to the fire.

The mechanics of Little Inferno are very simple: click the mouse in order to spark a fire, catch anything around and burn it.

There’s a catalog from which you can order objects and much of the game is linked to trying out various combinations in order to get combos and see how the more complex objects react to the touch of the flame.

Little Inferno also has a plot of sorts, with a mysterious pen pal sending letters and items to the player to burn.

The more interesting aspect of Little Inferno is that it quickly brought back memories of childhood, although I was never the kind of kid who played around with fire in an unsupervised manner.

I reclaimed a memory from when I was about 12 and, along with a friend, I lighted up gas which was seeping through a patch of badly patched concrete near one of the refineries in my town.

It was probably a stupid thing to do at the time, but it felt exhilarating and dangerous and the interplay between fire and the world around it was incredibly engaging to my young mind, although I should have probably known better.

For most gamers, Little Inferno will be no more than a momentary distraction, the kind of game they will fire up once in order to see what it has to offer and will then abandon after a few surprising moments, some giggles and maybe some cries of genuine terror.

But for a few, it will also create questions about our propensity to sit back and light up the world around us.

Worth a full Softpedia review? No.