We were big fans of developer Mattis Folkestad aka Machineboy’s charming adventure game Milkmaid of the Milky Way when it released on iOS back in January of 2017, giving it our Game of the Week nod as well as a solid 4 stars in our review. What was so nice about Milkmaid of the Milky Way was that, while it was indeed a traditional point-and-click adventure game with puzzles to solve, it was really more about the narrative and humor of the game than it was about testing your brain power, and I really liked that about it.
Well about a month and a half ago, Machineboy released their newest project called Embracelet on PC and Nintendo Switch. This was another adventure game, but rather than the pixel art style of Milkmaid it took place in a fully 3D polygonal world. You play as a young Norwegian boy named Jesper who inherits a special bracelet from his grandfather and is then tasked to visit the strange northern island where his grandfather grew up to return it to its original owner. The bracelet has magical powers that give Jesper abilities akin to telekinesis, and you’ll use that in order to solve the various puzzles around the island. Here is the launch trailer for the PC and Switch version of Embracelet so you can see it in action.
Very similarly to Milkmaid of the Milky Way, Embracelet doesn’t feature the most difficult puzzles to solve and is more about the narrative and exploring the world and its characters than anything else. The story can be genuinely touching and is also filled with some twists and turns that you’d never expect. Our own Shaun Musgrave really enjoyed the Nintendo Switch version of Embracelet when he gave it a Mini-View (that’s a miniature review!) back in September, saying that “As long as you’re not expecting too much on the mechanical end of things, you’ll probably find yourself as engrossed in Embracelet as I was." No specific pricing or release date has been announced for Embracelet on iOS, but Machineboy says that it will be a paid premium title and you can expect it to hit before the end of the year.
