Braid (video Game) - Reception

Reception

Upon its release to Xbox Live Arcade, Braid was met with nearly unanimously positive reviews, with an aggregate review score of 93% at Metacritic, making it the top-rated Xbox Live Arcade game and the 10th highest-rated Xbox 360 game. Braid was purchased by more than 55,000 people during the first week of release. According to Blow, Braid was the second-largest selling Xbox Live Arcade title in 2008 and sales were "very profitable", making him more money than if he had been working at a high-paying job for the time it took to develop the game.

Braid has been considered a masterpiece, and was highly praised for the unique puzzles it presented. Dan Whitehead of Eurogamer noted the creative variation on time manipulation and the need to understand the non-linearity of his actions made him feel as if "years of gaming blinders have been ripped away." Jason Hill of The Age stated the puzzles were "elaborate and formidable", but "impeccably designed and hugely satisfying to solve", a point reiterated by Sunday Herald Sun's Paddy Reiley. The connection between the puzzles and the overall presentation of the game was favorably received; Tom McShea of GameSpot stated that Braid was "the rare game that will make you rack your brain trying to solve puzzles one minute while challenging you to come to terms with its mature tale the next". Sam Roberts, game director for the Slamdance Film Festival Guerilla Gamemaking Competition, was impressed that Braid did not "feel immature" as it "expects much" of the player as any other form of media and "doesn't short you in any respect". Braid's artwork and presentation were given high regards. Nick Suttner of 1UP.com commented that Braid's artwork "juxtapose old-school design sensibilities with impressionist backdrops and lovingly hand-painted environments", while McShea stated that the game's visuals were "eye-catching but never distracting". Wired's Jean Snow wrote that Braid's "beautiful symphonic melodies contribute to what is already an impressive and unique vision", and that "the soothing tunes are probably the reason you never really lose it when facing particularly tough puzzles". Arthouse Games' Jason Rohrer interpreted the ability to rewind time indefinitely as a commentary about traditional platform game design: the fact the player is not forced to restart the level when they die gives greater emphasis to the game's "core challenges".

The game was primarily criticized for its short length. IGN's Hilary Goldstein stated that the game offers "no reason to come back" once you've completed all the puzzles. However, others compared Braid's short experience to similar criticisms with Portal in that its length "can be disregarded in the face of its unique approach to storytelling and expansive ideas". The game's price was also seen as a negative for the game, though McShea wrote that "Braid is worth every penny". Edge also noted that while Blow had tried to integrate the story and gameplay throughout the game, this only worked well in the final world, and otherwise the story was "a little trite in its self-conscious obscurity". However, others — including new media academics — have disagreed, praising the philosophical complexity of the game, saying "Jonathan Blow’s Braid is the sort of ontological labyrinth that Jorge Luis Borges might have made. Embedded in the simple gameplay design are genuinely huge concepts."

The PC version of the game was considered to be "faithful" to the Xbox 360 version of the game, retaining the same content without adding any new features. Reviewers commented that Braid benefited from keyboard controls. However, as a port of the Xbox 360 version, the lack of initial support for optimizing the graphics display for one's computer, either through larger screen resolutions or turning off certain game effects, was seen as a drawback, though it is expected that patches will be released to add these options. Both the PlayStation 3 and Macintosh ports of the game by Hothead Games were found to be easily accessible on the system and retained all the innovation and challenge of the original Xbox Live game.