7th Sector was released on 5 February 2020 by Sometimes You. It was developed by Sergey Noskov. The puzzle game was released on the PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and PC.
It’s not often that I’m able to enjoy a brain game for a game review. Sure, there is some strategy in FPS games like Call of Duty: Modern Warfare. You will definitely need some grey matter for a game like Two Point Hospital.
7th Sector offers something unique. The brain teaser takes you on a slow journey, with a mysterious storyline that will keep you motivated to continue. The game is designed with puzzles along every step of you the way, establishing it as one of the most in-depth puzzle games I have seen thus far.
Is 7th Sector worth buying though? Does the brain game do enough to appeal to your intelligence and logic? Let’s take a look in this 7th Sector review.
Contents
Pros and Cons
Pros:
- Amazing graphics
- interesting puzzles
- Some great gameplay mechanics
- Best side-scrolling interactivity
- Love the concept!
- The storyline keeps you engaged
- Creepy atmosphere at times
Cons
- Combat mechanics on the robots could be improved
First impressions
When you start playing 7th Sector, you are presented with the image of one of the old tube televisions. There are relays and wires connected to it, leading in different directions. And on the screen, there’s the silhouette of a man.
From the moment you start the game, the brain teaser begins. There is no help, no tutorial. You need to figure out what to do. From the get-go, it is very clear for the game review that 7th Sector is focused on being a puzzle game.
By pressing buttons and moving the analogue sticks, you eventually work out that you can travel across electrical cables as a small spark. As you progress through the game, it may seem like there is no story in this brain game. However, travelling across puzzles and cables, you soon realize that the story begins to unfold.
This mixture of a puzzle game with an unfolding story is what rates the brain teaser high in this 7th Sector review. The story is released at a relaxed pace, across several areas that you unlock as you travel.
The graphics are amazing. The close-up details are superb and the background fades away into darkness or mist. The detail makes it clear what is the main focus on the screen. And as with any puzzle game, you need to pay attention to your surroundings, which is why the graphics as so important.
There is also a chilly atmosphere create by the soft music and sounds. You can turn on radios, which will play music or the latest news. We felt that the sounds really created the perfect atmosphere and receives high ratings in this 7th Sector review.
I’ve mentioned the storyline a few times. I don’t want to spoil how it unfolds for you. I will simply mention that it details a war between humans and machines, which is reminiscent of the Terminator movie storylines. It gives the atmosphere of a cyberpunk dystopia.
Playing the Game
As already mentioned in this 7th Sector game review, you move across electrical cables to new areas. It is the only way to access areas that progress the brain game’s storyline. Along the way, you will find some obstacles that you need to surpass. This is where the puzzle games come in.
We found the puzzle games to be a mixture of easy and complex difficulties. While the game plays out as a side-scroller, there are definite 3D elements to overcome. Everything on the screen is important, and you need to pay attention to your surroundings are clues to the brain teasers.
For instance, there is one moment in the puzzle game where you find a locked door. There are no clues for how to open the door. If you head back, you find that you can spark into a remote control and ride one of the toy cars. With this car, you can move an electrical ball around, which can then be placed in front of the door. A sensor above the door scans the ball, and the door opens.
There are other puzzles in this brain game that will be very familiar to puzzle heads. On some panels, you need to get the right frequency or electrical current to continue on. You will need to play with switches to figure out the correct combination.
Eventually, you will be able to gain control of a robot and shoot your way passed other robots to proceed. This brings a small action element to the puzzle game. It was rather a surprise to find action after the puzzle nature found in the 7th Sector review. It changed the pace of the game, but thankfully this didn’t happen too often.
What Could Be Better
Which brings us to the one element of 7th Sector we felt could be improved in our game review: The robot combat mechanism. We had progressed very quickly through the puzzle game, mastering the brain teasers as quickly as we could. It took us a good two hours before we actually ‘possessed’ our first robot.
What a terrible experience. We died so many times trying to pass the first area that we initially gave up. Your robot doesn’t heal. You need to carefully walk through the area and kill all the bots and drones along the way without dying at all.
This became intensely frustrating. The aiming mechanism is difficult to exactly pinpoint the drones you need to kill. By the time you have targeted the enemy, you’ve received so much damage already.
You can try and shoot them from a distance before they see you. We found this to be the best tactic. However, this often alerts other bots and drones, which then just causes you to die anyway.
For a puzzle game, we felt it could have done without a combat mechanic. Sure, it adds some action to the game, but it also adds a lot of frustration. I enjoy the brainy puzzle elements more than trying to work out the best way to shoot ourselves through.
Final Verdict
7th Sector integrates a storyline that unfolds slowly with a decent puzzle game. It weaves the story into the gameplay while presenting some brain teasers along the way. It will keep you entertained for hours while finding the best way to work through your obstacles within these beautiful scenes. The only element we believe could be improved is the robot combat control.
7th Sector Review presents a game rating of 8/10 in this Nintendo Switch game review.
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