SpaceChem

It’s hard to pinpoint exactly why one keeps returning to this game. It is not exactly unpleasant, merely very taxing on the brain. Indeed, describing Spacechem as ‘fun’ may be pushing the use of the word to the very limit. It is more akin to the satisfaction one gains from solving a particularly complicated maths puzzle, or successfully hoiking out an errant breadcrumb from your keyboard using a modified paper-clip fashioned into a complex grabbing tool.

The blue and red widgets, showing the layout of two simple atoms paths - confused yet?

This game is difficult. It may well be a cliché, but it is fiendishly difficult, in that one might imagine an actual fiend, one of the demons from the nine circles of hell, rubbing his scaly hands together in glee and drooling unspeakable drool at the thought of unleashing this creation upon unsuspecting humanity.

The objective of this so called ‘game’ is to manipulate and control atoms and molecules within a graphical representation of a chemical factory. One is given various tasks along the lines of creating certain types of bonds, or molecules, then delivering them out of the reactor. Atoms are moved around using a ‘widget’, which is essentially a type of railway which can travel in only one direction. The player must place this ‘railway’ in a certain way so as to guide the atoms and molecules around the screen in the correct orientation to ensure the right reactions take place. And fuck me, that sounds boring when I write it, but makes for very engaging puzzle shenanigans.

This is as exciting as the screenshots get I'm afraid

Being a science graduate I was mildly pleased to see the correct types of bonds and molecules that are formed – all in line with what is actually possible in the real world. Expert planning is required to send the atoms around your railway track with the right timing – various tools such as synchronised gates help with this.

The game starts out merely difficult at first, but rapidly rises through the ranks, reaching brain-teasing, confounding, puzzling and nigh-impossible in a very short space of time. You will frequently shut the game down in disgust, swearing under your breath, only to cogitate the answer subconsciously, while asleep, or in the bath, or have it spring into your mind like the theory of gravity to Newton, before leaping back to the monitor and completing the puzzle with a satisfactory smirk. It is a fool’s errand however – the only reward that awaits is an even more difficult puzzle beyond. Such is mans folly in his own knowledge.

This 3rd one is totally off the hook

Eventually one graduates to using multiple reactors at once to create larger and larger molecules. You will soon find yourself staring at the screen with the same sort of empty, confounded expression that a young boy from the countryside might have after being introduced to some artwork of Escher by a creepy old uncle.

In conclusion, this game is one of the most mentally challenging I have ever played, and while not to everyone’s taste, if you consider yourself a human of above-average intelligence, it will provide a worthy challenge. If you consider yourself a human of only average intelligence, then the warm grey slop that drips out of your ears while you try this game is in fact liquified brain.

Spacechem scores – Alarmed Goat