The story of Machinarium is a difficult one to describe. You play as a robot in a world full of robots (even cats and birds are robots), and that's really all you're given at the start of the game. There is no dialog or text (with the exception of menu text) in the entire game. And it works brilliantly. In place of text you are given character actions to observe, and in place of dialog you are given thought bubbles that show a short video of what that character is thinking. All of these portrayals are utterly charming, and immerse you in the game's bizarrely mechanical world.

The game's nameless hero is a particularly adorable little robot. I don't think that I need to tell you just how adorable he is, the screenshots speak for themselves, but allow me to at least say that throughout the game his animations and interactions truly bring him to life. It's hard not to root for the little guy as he travels from place to place. Don't be surprised if the urge just to spend more time with him becomes just as much a motivation to continue playing as the story and gameplay.

Speaking of gameplay, Machinarium makes an effort to streamline the point-and-click adventure genre to alleviate frustration and keep the game moving at a steady pace. And with only one exception (more on that later) it succeeds magnificently. Each screen of the game is essentially a self-contained puzzle. There are the rare instances where an item may be carried from one area to the next, but for the most part all the tools you need for a given puzzle are provided without backtracking through several screens. And when I say puzzles, I mean both of the "bring object X to character Y" variety as well as the "align colored pegs on a grid" logic puzzles that are synonymous with the Professor Layton series of games. These latter logic puzzles are integrated seamlessly into the game as a method to open a door or activate a piece of broken machinery, and add some nice variety to a genre often bogged down by fetch quests.

Movement in Machinarium is also somewhat restricted for the sake of streamlining the experience. The little robot can only interact with objects that are within his arm's reach. He has the ability to stretch and squash his body to help reach high and low objects (and for solving a few puzzles as well), but this means that you will be moving the robot around a lot. However, you will quickly find that you cannot move the little robot anywhere you wish in the environment. Instead he will move to pre-determined points in the environment where the objects that you can actually use are located. If you can move somewhere, then most likely there's something you need to do there to help solve a puzzle. If you've played many adventure games before then you know how frustrating it can be to pixel hunt for exactly the right place to stand or which objects you can interact with. Imagine how much more fun the game would be if that frustration were gone: that's what Machinarium is.

This is not to say that the puzzles are easy in Machinarium. Just because the game guides you to specific locations doesn't mean that you will always know what you need to do there, nor what order you need to do things in. Some experimentation is needed to see how items interact with each other, with a keen eye for detail often being your most valuable puzzle solving tool. In case you do get stuck, which happened more than a few times during my playthrough, there is a well integrated hint system in the game. For quick help you can click on the thought bubble hint, which shows you either the first or last step of a room's puzzle. These hints are helpful for keeping you on-track without giving away a puzzle's full solution. At one point the thought bubble showed the robot electrocuting a robotic cat. Even with the hint I still needed to figure out on my own how to electrocute the cat, and then what exactly I was supposed to do with the shocked feline once it was in my inventory. These hints act as a signpost to help you focus on a particular part of the puzzle and never felt like they approached the realm of cheating. And if you do feel like they are cheating, then simply don't use them.

If you manage to get completely stuck on a puzzle there is another type of hint which will show you a storyboard of exactly what you need to do to complete it. However there is a price for this level of enlightenment, and that price is one of the most boring and tedious minigames you will ever see. You'll probably use this method once or twice for particularly challenging puzzles, but the minigame is terrible enough to discourage any player from using the hints as a crutch for every puzzle in the game. Personally, I feel that it works perfectly. The puzzle solutions are there if you need them, but if you aren't going to be solving the puzzles on your own the game punishes you with a few minutes of boredom.

I suppose it's about time I finally got around to addressing Machinarium's visual style. Simply put, the game is gorgeous. Every inch of the game has been painstakingly hand drawn, resulting in one of the most hauntingly beautiful games in recent memory. The robot world is built with mechanical precision, and yet also contains the subtle dilapidation of a scrap yard. I first fell in love with Machinarium a year ago based on the visuals alone, and after finishing the game now I only love the graphics more. And to accompany the stunning visuals is an amazing soundtrack that adds even more atmosphere to the environments, as well as some catchy beats. As a bonus if you order the game from Amanita Design's site, the game comes with the full soundtrack in MP3 form so you can listen to it outside the game, something I have been doing non-stop for the past several days. (Note: the soundtrack may also be included if you download through Steam, but I cannot confirm this since I didn't use Steam. The Steam page for Machinarium doesn't mention the soundtrack though, so I would assume that it is not included).

Machinarium is not without its faults though. The little robot, adorable as he may be, isn't exactly built for speed. Walking from place to place can get tedious toward the end of the game, and doubly so if you have stretched or squashed him for a puzzle, in which case he moves twice as slow. It's a minor gripe compared to an overwhelmingly amazing game, but it's worth mentioning. What isn't such a minor gripe is one particular puzzle about a third of the way through the game. This puzzle is more of a minigame in which you must win a 5-in-a-row game similar to Go before you can continue. This minigame is devilishly hard and took at least 40 minutes before I managed to win a match. Considering that the entire game clocks in at around 3-5 hours, a 40 minute lull being stuck on a single puzzle is a significant amount of time, and was the only point when the game's pacing felt anything other than perfect.

The last issue with the game you might have noticed in that last paragraph: it's only about 3-5 hours long. It took me just barely over 4 hours to complete, and that includes the time with the hated 5-in-a-row puzzle. The game is short, and feels even shorter because of how engrossed you become in the experience. Is 4 hours worth $20? Everyone may answer differently, but it's an issue you should be aware of before diving into the game.

Even with those complaints, I can recommend Machinarium to anyone without any hesitation. It might be short, but the experience is well worth the trip. The atmosphere is impeccable and the characters, even minor ones, are bursting from their metallic seams with personality. If you have even a passing interest in adventure games or puzzles, then you owe it to yourself to spend some time in the robot world of Machinarium. It's this year's Portal: a short but unforgettable game with a healthy dose of puzzles and wit thrown in. Simply put, Machinarium is one of the best games released this year.

9.5 out of 10

Machinarium is available through Steam and Direct 2 Drive for Windows, or from Amanita Design's website for Windows, Mac, and Linux