Blue Prince split the internet, but still deserves acclaim

REVIEW: While its random elements will churn many, players who push through will be rewarded by this game's unique puzzle-box design and enduring mystery.

The first room you’ll see in Blue Prince. And you’ll see it a lot.

I pull the lever and the piano music starts to swell. The stone shutter covering the door to the coveted Room 46 starts to open. Finally, I've cracked the game. I've spent about 50 hours plotting rooms and solving light maths and word association puzzles. I had solved this devilishly tricky puzzle game.

But, I stumbled upon this lever by accident. I had no firm route to the chamber of the door I just opened. With the emotive music in full swing, the game acting as if I had beaten it, I haplessly try to draft my way to the antechamber containing the doorway to Room 46. I hit a dead end. Then another one. And finally, a locked door with no way to open it. The continuing emotive piano chords mocking me as I was forced to reset.

Best described as an escape room on steroids, Blue Prince is a puzzle-based rogue-lite game, focused around…