Buy InFlux

Amazing environment and love the interactions with objects. If you are a bang bang shooter up type you won't like it. If you are of the MYST genre and like atmospheric environments, you will love it.

The puzzle levels by themselves would have made for a decent puzzle game, but the lush overworld that ties it all together, and provides a sort of action/adventure game on the side make this a must-have indie title. Graphically sound, tight controls, fun while it lasts. Not too much replay value though.

The visuals are decent, but everything else is bad. I really wanted to give up on this game mid way, but I was hoping something interesting would happen. I completed the game after 5 hours and was very disappointed. I felt it was tedious, boring, and pointless. You just move a ball around through the world and complete short mini puzzles that are a slight variation of the same thing every time.

Not a bad little game. Graphics and atmosphere are nice. The platforming is fun, I only wish there was more and a little less puzzle solving. People are right, control of the ball is pretty poor. Sometimes just from moving a bit you go flying forward and you can usually never stop your momentum which is annoying. Trying to attract and move the other ball can be kind of annoying and isn't super realistic or done well. There is no story at all. The developer is cool because he's involved on forums and talked about how the game did and how money went before and after the game, which was a cool perspective to have from the developer. 6.5/10.

A mysterious adventure puzzle game, which works quite well. Not too short but also not so long to complete. Have some gameplay issues (mostly lagging in some levels) but it's a quite good game.

81/100

InFlux is the equivalent of a drop-dead beautiful girl who charms you with her wit before tripping over nothing and falling down a flight of stairs.

I can't really describe the game--it's a weird mix of abstract puzzle-solving and gorgeous outdoor environments. The puzzles themselves are clever but never venture into crazy difficult territory. I do wish the game relied less on me accidentally coming across the solution rather than letting me look around and solve it myself. That said, most puzzles still give a very pleasing "aha!" reward.

Navigating the world that links the puzzles is, for the most part, pleasing, but the ball you play as controls awfully. Expect to fall off cliffs, get stuck in the level geometry, or lose control numerous times. Overall, the controls are sluggish and, at times, unresponsive, which hampers the experience when you're starting to get into the game. Also, the camera is awful, sticking to walls as you rotate puzzle chambers and generally being a nusiance.

The environments are large and a joy to speed through, and the game even gives a word-free story that is surprisingly well-paced. It's very weird to see a game like this not only include a story, but do it in a way that feels surreal and captivating, rather than forced in. For me, the drive to explore this beautiful world was what kept me playing, and the game rewarded me with jaw-dropping vistas and a beautiful ambient score.

In short, InFlux is GORGEOUS and a great buy for puzzle and non-puzzle fans alike, as long as you can put up with the awful controls. Also, the game is taxing on lower- to mid-range machines.

This was an incredibly good game as an interactive piece of art!

The gameplay is also fun and casual, but by the end, I felt a deep and lingering sense of attachment to the ball, the whale and the setting - despite the lack of dialogue or any obvious displays of narrative. It may be the fact that the ball had no way to communicate and no one to communicate with, and must therefore keep the experience of its journey internalized throughout the game, that you feel for it more: the silent protagonist. But this feeling may depend on the sensitivity of the player.

Another point of praise goes to the soundtrack, which was beautiful, relaxing and fitting to the game.

Technically, the game was sound, with some areas left for improvement. The camera reaction to world collisions can be jarring, and coupled with the strong motion blur used by the game, may cause a few people eye strain or motion sickness. Loading models sometimes caused momentary pauses in the middle of gameplay; and jumps in model level-of-detail are sometimes incongruent.

Overall, I recommend you in buying this game. :)

Its marble madness all over again in 3d, nice recreation of of a throwback and its crazy fun with a trackball.

yeah good

Amazing game. A must have for pc gamers.

This is a rather long review, so if you just want a brief summary of why I recommend this game skip to Results and read from there.

Impromptu Games creates a fantastic puzzle mystery which keeps the gears in your brain continually grinding. InFlux offers a serene ambience with melodic music that produces a peaceful environment that is calming.

Campaign:
Influx is the story of a small ball and its adventure to complete mazes, explore an island, and collect orbs. You must collect orbs in each area in order to unlock the maze that allows you to progress to the next section. The island continually grows as you progress through this amazing campaign and the emptiness keeps you wondering at every turn. I completed the game in about 3-hours, which means it’s not a very long game. You could spend more time exploring the landscape although because of the poor mechanics of the protagonist exploration can seem rather annoying at times.

Ambience:
The rhythmic music and simplicity of Influx creates at times a very peaceful experience. The game offers a very vivid environment without any traces of even the simplest story. Without a story to follow Influx produces something most games lack, answers. I found myself continually wondering why there were empty houses on the Island, how the modern maze structures formed, why I was even solving the puzzles, and the list goes on and on.

Gameplay:
The protagonist, a small ball, is able to roll and boost in order to accomplish tasks. There is no point where this character can jump, but by using boosts correctly you can launch yourself into various places. An interesting feature behind controlling the character is that you can boost while in mid air allowing you to change direction. Boosting also slows down time which allows you to gain a view of your environment while deciding how to act in a fast paced situation. Although there are time where controlling the character can be tricky the overall experience is relatively easy.

Results:
If you like puzzles, modern graphics, beautiful scenery, and melodious music then this would be the game for you. Despite there being more cons than pros I would recommend this game, but only if you can find it on sale for at least 75% off. InFlux is a short, but very riveting puzzle game. If you are a fan of puzzle games then this is the game for you.

Pros:
+Interesting puzzles and mazes
+Beautiful serene scenery
+Smooth loading transitions
+Peaceful and elegant music

Cons:
-Poor controls (can be annoying to control the protagonist)
-Lack of explanation
-Listed control to boost, but doesn't unlock till half way through the game
-Attract ability can be infuriating as it forms an orbit rather than just pulling an object to you.
-Too short of a campaign

Very relaxing, very enjoyable. The zen vibe is palpable. Aided by a cool soundtrack, chill atmosphere, and beautiful landscape even at lower settings.

For some reason I had trouble installing it, but once I got it working it was totally worth it.

It's largely free roaming exploration and it's quite easy to understand what to do due to it's simplicity.

Due to how enraptured I was into the game, it was actually a little shorter than I anticipated. It could really benefit from an additional level or two under a different kind of landscape, like perhaps a snowy tundra, a space level, or a man made system of some kind.

Still if you need to relax, but you also want to have fun while doing it, then I highly recommend this game.

InFlux is a rather unique (from my experience) ambient exploration/puzzle game. You play as a ball exploring an island and completing puzzles to unlock new paths to continue on your journey. It seemed like a perfect fit for me and it is somewhat, but I can't help but feel like the game is a bit of a missed opportunity.

The island is a visually great place. While the game doesn't have cutting edge AAA graphics, and it shows, the visual design is very pleasing. The ball itself looks surprisingly good and the light generated from within adds a nice effect while you roll around. The puzzles themselves take place in a sort of virtual world which have a nice clean design that is unfortunately marred by some of the most poorly done motion blur I have ever seen with no way that I have found to turn it off.

Past the visuals, the rest of the game really isn't up to par. Rolling around the island can be a chore at times with lots of sudden changes in the ground surface that will stop you or send you awkwardly up into the air. The puzzles are for the most part quite simple and can be completed with ease, but the levitation fans and vents you come across often don't bring you as high as they're supposed to, and the game's own hint of aiming up in order to go higher when boosting simply doesn't work.

The other main issue is performance. While the game ran plenty fast for me, my framerate was amazingly low for the graphical quality and it makes me concerned about running this game on lower end hardware, even video cards that could manage newer AAA games just fine. Coupled with this, the game doesn't seem to take advantage of the Unreal engine's dynamic data loading so the game stutters badly whenever it needs to load new data, often at strange places while you move around. At one point the entire game froze for 2 seconds due to this.

So while I'd like to recommend this game, I really can't. With additional and more complex puzzles, a better controlling ball, and some work in the engine department it could be a really great game. Where it is now, I'm just disappointed that it isn't more.

best game ever 10/10 i'm totally not the developer (i am the developer)

The entire time I spent playing InFlux, I kept wondering to myself and trying to discern just what about it was causing me to dislike it so much. But ultimately it became clear that there was no one thing that was so abhorrent as to destroy the game, but a long list of mediocre mechanics, frustrating moments, and missed potential stacked upon each other to create a game that is not fun to play.

And you really wouldn't notice this from the outside, so much is the subtlety of InFlux's deeply permeated problems. What appears to be an average, but solid physics based ball puzzle game is instead a amalgamation of poor design decisions and tedious level designs.

The most easily called out of these issues is the sluggish and clunky controls of your ball. There is such an absurd amount of momentum attached to movement that it's nearly impossible to retain any control even when moving slowly. It's as if there's a second invisible player playing beside you which constantly wants to go in the opposite direction, and you are left to try and wrestle control back away from them as you try to move forward with anything resembling precision.

This of course bleeds into the actual puzzle designs, which naturally require excessive amounts of control and constrained movements in order to complete, something which is nigh impossible given the previous paragraph. Compounded upon this is the astounding amount of tedium built into each and every puzzle, often placing you back at the beginning of long sequences for the slightest mistake, and making completion feel like a brief relief before you're put right back into an even more aggravating level. There's nothing clever or satisfying to find here, just an abundance of cheap failures and unrefined design.

This finally ties all the way back around to the clash of styles presented with the presentation. The game is split into two parts: that of navigating a realistic, occasionally rather pretty world ripe with nature, and that or completing the actual puzzles in a sterile white box floating somewhere in the cosmos. The transitions are glaring and abrupt, and turn the parts of the environment that are actually interesting to look at into little more than glorified conduits to carry you from one stale puzzle to the next. This isn't to say the overworld (for lack of a better term) is actually a compelling place to explore, as it feels as barren and underdeveloped as anything in the game, but in comparison to the drab color pallet of the puzzles at least presents an occasional bit of eye candy to counteract the monotony of constantly being in the same room.

There might have been some point where InFlux was coming along into something decent (I'd like to think so at least), but if so something went terribly wrong at some point and sent the entire game careening down the crapper. No matter how hard I tried to enjoy it, every single moment I spent with it was nothing but dull and frustrating, leaving me feeling like the game was just waiting for me to give up on it so it could roll over and die like the lifeless creation it is.

THis was a game unlike any other in my collection, something chill and relaxing that I could just throw on at the end of a long day and kind of fade away into. The puzzle engages just enough grey matter to be enjoyable, but are spread out enough that just exploring the world and finding neat landscapes in between breaks up the experience into a joyful take-at-your-own-pace eerie wonder. It's so rare to find a game which favours and rewards self-exploration for those of us who just like to meander through every nook and corner for idle amusement.

Do you remember that joy of discover you had when playing Portal? This game has that. No obvious tutorials, it's a fascinating and weird landscape where mechanics are gently added to your repertoire. Absorbing and fascinating.

It's not going to be for everyone, sure. And it does have a few quirky things. But there's just something about it that I found to be compelling.

So, this game really is loads of awesomeness. It has an incredibly calm atmosphere, lush graphics, ridiculously smooth gameplay, and aims to bring a new light to problem-solving and virtual puzzles. Its originality in terms of both puzzles and overall gameplay really gives off a great vibe, and in my opinion, it feels like the developers really knew what they wanted from this game. They executed this indie game extremely well and it really shows.

I have not had the chance to play this game with a controller, but for a mouse and keyboard(which feels more natural to me than a controller), the controls are perfect. The developers really struck a beautiful balance in terms of how you control the gameplay, and subsequently, how the gameplay controls you. They left the complexity and problem-solving to the puzzles of the game and made the controls simplistic. Perfection.

On the topic of the puzzles, they also match this game perfectly. As you can see from the teaser video clips, the puzzles take on this abstract form of obstacles within multi-dimensional cubes of glass and steel. Without spoiling anything(or too much anyways), at first glance you would figure this combination to clash with the original atmosphere of the game, but it's quite the opposite; the transfers are done so seamlessly that the player remains undisturbed, and continues to flow through the calm, dream-like gameplay that is InFlux. Most of the puzzles are simple, a couple of them frustrating, but not so frustrating that you want to turn the game off or bang your head against a wall. They always keep you coming back.

At the end of the day, this is a fantastic game with an amazing atmosphere that keeps you coming back for more; and honestly, that is the kind of result you want from a problem-solving game of this caliber. If you are on the edge about whether to buy this game or not, just go ahead and buy it and thank me later. For its miniscule price, you get an experience easily worth ten times the amount(was on-sale for $2.99 when I wrote this review).

Beautiful and mysterious, though more for lovers of tranquil exploration and spherical geometry than serious puzzle fantastic. Some puzzle areas are well put together, but inaccurate controls bring about a lot of frustration. On top of that one half of the game lacks challenge, while the other half lacks surprise. Add those together and you’ll get a game that never becomes more than the sum of its parts.There are some puzzles worth cracking, but as the scheme behind most challenges can hardly be made out at the get-go, most solutions are revealed by annoying trial&error.Overall 6/10.

As a fan of marble games like Marble Blast Ultra, and Switchball, it's an interesting blend of the two. It's broken apart into six different hub worlds, each containing 3 puzzle areas. These hub worlds are wide open natural vistas, whereas the puzzle rooms look a lot like those Marble Blast Ultra. Most of the puzzles deal with world rotation, and getting other marbles to designated areas.

The movement feels pretty different than Marble Blast Ultra, mostly in that you carry much more momentum, and you don't have a button to jump. They introduce a charge boost though, that accomplishes similar goals. It has a small story being told organically through the world, and it's just a really satisfying time. I'd highly recommend it to dudes that dug Marble Blast Ultra/Switchball/Spectraball.