Patrick's Parabox

Patrick's Parabox is one of the 'big 5' Sokoban puzzle games in our current golden age for brain-melting masterpieces. Those 5, in order of stature on Steam, are: Baba is You (2019) Void Stranger (2023) Patrick's Parabox (2022) Stephen's Sausage Roll (2016) Isles of Sea and Sky (2024) This is the most 'out there' puzzle game I've come across. The most essential thing that Patrick's Parabox does is take a copy of the level you are playing, shrink it down to the size of a single square on the grid, and then place the level itself, inside the level. This creates very strange movement possibilities and the game embraces that weirdness with glee. Inventive, strange, innovative, a continual WTF-machine in the best way. I am, at best, an intermediate puzzle gamer, and I was able to finish this. Patrick's Parabox does two things well. It supports gradual learning as you go along (but without repeating itself in a tedious or hand-holdy way). And it includes a LOT of crazy optional puzzles for the most dedicated fans. I genuinely surprised myself by making it to the credits. For hardcore advanced puzzle gamers, there are extra layers. Great stuff.

I do not recommend myself to play this for 1 hour straight. I feel like a part of me is slowly dying. Still love the game but my oh my did I lost all my will to live after encountering a hard level.

Great puzzle game, Patrick is really something else designing those. While it excels in game design, it lacks in art and in what lives in between. I don't enjoy the music, and the art style is quite simplistic. Yes it is a hard concept to grasp (recursion), and that part is beautifully executed / visually explained. However I do miss something to attach me to this world, I find it too objective / stripped down for what could be a piece of art. I'm also not the biggest fan of the world progression being completely streamlined and categorized for you beforehand. There's not much (if anything) for you to discover in between the lines. Everything you see is everything you get. It feels like no reflection or immersion happens here.