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Crush fires on all cylinders. It’s exceedingly smart, well-designed, and takes a very interesting approach to its third-person perspective puzzle- and platforming action. It holds a compelling story about a troubled boy wandering through his own mind, and is gorgeously rendered in the manner of someone’s psychedelic waking dream. It is clearly a labor of love for all involved, and it shows in many ways.

Correction: Crush fires on all cylinders but one. It’s simply lacking that great intangible, that certain je ne sais quoi.

Painful to note as it may be, Crush is simply not very fun.

Might as Well Crush …

Players take the role of Danny, a troubled young man and insomniac. In a radical form of therapy, Danny takes to using C.R.U.S.H., a fanciful device that translates the user’s brain into puzzles. The goal, of course, is to explore the levels, collect the good stuff, drop the hammer on those pesky neuroses, and resolve the internal conflicts by making it to the end of the stage. In terms of gameplay, that means a lot of marble collection, trophy acquisition, crawling, hopping, and smashing stuff with other stuff.

Neons and pastels color the world Danny has created, giving the game’s four environments a suitably otherworldly feel. The device C.R.U.S.H. takes a more orderly approach to arranging Danny’s psychic detritus, offering blocks that are hollow, solid, or ghostly; ramps; stairs; and psychological hang-ups manifesting themselves as cockroaches, cages, and the like.

The novelty comes in the form of the manipulation of the levels. Danny can slam his foot to the ground  and “crush” his world at will, transforming a three-dimensional landscape into a two-dimensional one. In doing so, the gameplay map is dramatically altered, giving the protagonist access to new areas, fusing portions of the stage that were previously separated by gaps, and merging pieces of geometry to, say, connect two halves of a trophy together.

Within the third dimension, players can alter the perspective further by using the PSP’s D-pad. Pressing the D-pad left or right alters the camera angle, and players can shift in and out from a top-down view to a more traditional, horizontal view by tapping up or down on the pad. This, in turn, affects a newly crushed world, creating platforms and crawlspaces, where there previously were none.

In the shifting back and forth between these disparate perspectives, in the addition and subtraction of dimensions, the game finds its heart. Here, then, is the perfect setup for one of video game’s most intriguing prospects: A game that dramatically alters the way the players must approach not only puzzles, but the game world. It’s not a stretch to suggest Crush requires players to think in an entirely new way. 

Everything that Crushes Must Converge…

Innovation only carries Crush so far. There’s a great deal of challenge to be had, and the game ramps ups its difficulty in fairly short order, introducing hazards and enemies, and creating punishing time restrictions. Completists will have a devil of a time collecting all the game’s puzzle pieces, trophies, and marbles. To the point: This is not a game for lightweights. Nor will Crush suffer casual game players—despite the fact that a hint system is built right in and easily accessible by pressing the PSP’s triangle gameplay button.

Agonizingly, there’s no appeal save for the challenge and the manipulation. The game becomes an exercise in moving worlds for the sake of collecting baubles to find an exit to move to a new stage to move some more worlds. The tiger, in essence, chases its tail for as long as players can stand—and mileage certainly will vary.

Simply, Crush lacks the addictive charm and sense of accomplishment that Tetris provides. It fails to offer the simple buildup and denoument of, say, a crossword- or Soduku puzzle when all the pieces come together in an ever-increasing rush. It can’t even hope to match the accessibility of a Minesweeper or Bejeweled. It’s got a whopper of a premise and a perspective that’s not been seen before, but it’s as dry as toast in the Sahara.

A caveat here: Games don’t necessarily have to be fun to be successful. The overwhelmingly creepy and disturbing adventure Silent Hill is perhaps the antithesis of fun, but it succeeds because it’s the train wreck everyone has to look at, the scab that can’t go unpicked. Its horror carries players to the end—breathlessly, and without the slightest bit of fun for anyone holding the controller. Crush has nothing to grab players beyond its incessant perspective shifting and unique approach to gameplay. It offers puzzles and challenges, to be sure, but not the things that make people want to tackle them. It is, at its essence, missing something all-too-important to disregard.

This, then, is a game to experience. It’s a game to point to, and champion, as an innovator in what it presents to players. It’s one of the most novel games ever made. In bite-sized portions, it really should be played.

It’s important.

It’s just not … that.

Article by: Greg Orlando
Video produced by: Michael Benson