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Published: January 12, 2010
I am not versed in modern art, I would like to be but I am not. Just like I would like to know what the wine I drink is supposed to convey or the quality and age of the whisky I drink. As it is now I like to look at cubes as art, drink wine no matter what grape it is from and whisky is what goes the cheapest at the bar. If I had been an art buff I would known about the life and art of Piet Mondrian.
Piet Mondrian(1972-1944) was a Dutch painter mostly known for his geometric compositions with horizontal and vertical black lines upon a white ground with the three primary colours: red, blue and white. This style he coined Neo-Plasticism, and I can safely say that it isn’t what I would buy if I had the money for it.
In Mondrian for the iPhone you get to help Piet Mondrian find his final rest in peace. His art has been scattered around the world, and you have to salvage it from attics, basements and wherever people store old stuff. To help Piet you have to restore his paintings by turning a scrambled piece of art into the original piece.
Mondrian is a block puzzle with a completely new set of rules. Once a piece of art is started you see how it looks scrambled, and by pressing the solution button you can see what the end result should be. In as few moves as possible you have to move the blocks into their correct positions. Initially it is quite easy doing this but soon new rules enter the game. Some blocks come with numbers on them showing how many times they must be moved. The even harder blocks are grey, and by sliding them into coloured blocks they gain that colour too.
When you get stuck you can get help from Piet, at the cost of him abusing you somewhat. Piet Mondrian seems to be quite harsh with a sharp tongue taunting you whenever he has the opportunity. Still I find him likeable enough to actually help him finding and restoring his art. The game world is basically the world map drawn into Neo-Plastic form, and you have to travel from city to city solving puzzles. To progress you have to clear all the puzzles for a location, and at times that becomes really hard. As a puzzle game this is really for the hardcore audience as it demands both logical puzzle skills and spatial intelligence.
Graphics are great, heck what else can I say as it is a game based on art. Everything is based on the art of Mondrian, and the clean lines and primary colours appeals to me. The Piet Mondrian graphics is a bit lifeless, sure he is dead but still I would have liked more variation to his looks and expressions. Sound is minimal with just basic sliding blocks sounds. There is no music at all but you can either create your own playlist within the game or play your own music before starting it up.
Mondrian is a great game injecting loads of personality, and style into a genre that usually is just associated with blue blocks. The puzzles are hard, and I will never finish all of the artworks available. It would be nice to be able to skip some puzzles, and still progress to avoid getting stuck in a city. This will be changed in an upcoming update according to the developer, and the timer will also become optional. Mondrian is the game to get if you are looking for a competent, challenging, educational puzzler brimming with personality.
Final Rating
Mondrian $2.99
Version: 1.0
Seller: Fuzzi Tail Software LLC
Review disclosure: Any games reviewed on this page may have been provided to us by the developer for the purposes of this review. Note: the resulting review score is never impeded by this fact, all opinions are that of the TouchGen reviewer and not the developer. This is in keeping with our O.A.T.S oath. Read more about O.A.T.S here
4 Comments on "Mondrian review"
Legend.inc on Tue, 12th Jan 2010 7:07 am
Deep review. It’s nice.
Jef Armstrong on Tue, 12th Jan 2010 1:54 pm
Thanks for the review Torbjörn! Yes, I ready with an update which allows you to jump to any location and play the puzzles there even if you are stuck on a previous one. Also, there is a lot more help included. I’m going through testing right now and the update should be available very soon.
Tim on Tue, 9th Feb 2010 1:04 pm
I think I want this game, but I don’t think I have a clear understanding of what it plays like. I wish there were a light version.
Tim on Wed, 10th Feb 2010 8:39 am
I picked it up on sale for $0.99 and I love it! Wonderful visual presentation, very challenging, fresh gameplay and the oh-so sarcastic Piet Mondrian make this a must-have for less than a US dollar.