An unknown boy wakes up in the 2D world of LIMBO. Throughout the grayscale side-scrolling world of Limbo, the boy makes his way through a puzzle-platforming environment all in hopes of finding out the fate of his sister.

It should be noted that PlayDead Studios, the people responsible for LIMBO, call the game a “trial-and-death” adventure.

I had to go to xbox.com to find out what this game was about, and all the LIMBO page said about the game is “Uncertain of his sister's fate, a boy enters LIMBO.”

LIMBO is one of those games which doesn’t really try to erase boundaries and put gamers on a nearly level playing field, PlayDead Studios’ imagining of Limbo does it naturally.

An unknown child wakes up in a 2D grayscale world, and once the player has control of the unknown child, it’s time to start your trek through the puzzle-platformer world that is Limbo in order to find his sister’s fate.

Black makes up the majority of Limbo with the unknown child, other life forms, the objects you interact with, and finally the terrain above and below your feet.

Various shades of gray make up the fog and water of LIMBO adding to the feeling that you’re wandering Limbo.

White is used extremely sparingly with your eyes, the occasional butterfly, and other less memorable uses.

This is really where LIMBO shines brightly, and levels the playing field for everyone that has use of their eyes. Limbo is drained of color putting those with and without color impairments on equal ground. The intent is there for everyone to not see every trap that lays in wait for the unsuspecting player.

The colors are used in a way where it’s supposed to be clear in places and it’s really supposed to be hazy and dark. I wouldn’t necessarily consider this to be a detriment to disabled gamers so much as the game just being out to get the player no matter who they are.

Adding to the already eerie atmosphere of Limbo is the use of only the most necessary ambient sounds which is really the only area of accessibility where LIMBO falls short.

There are puzzles within that are dependent on the player’s ability to hear something happening off-screen in order to solve the puzzle.
There’s a puzzle in the first 10 minutes of the game where you’re put face to face with a spider. In order to solve the first part of the puzzle, which is to get the means to beat the spider, you have to taunt it into striking at you and missing in order to hit the ground 2 or 3 times so a trap that was hanging precariously in a tree will fall so you’re able to use it against the spider.

The trap is very easy to see in the tree, but once you are face to face with the spider, the trap is off-screen. The controller doesn’t shake, and there is no visual cue to let the player know what just happened. I had to go online for help with this one.

The control scheme employed during gameplay is very simple - directional movement (with the left stick), action (“B” button), and jump (the “A“ or “Y“ button). This evens the playing field even further making it matter significantly less if you have one hand or two.

There are no difficulty settings in LIMBO, so it is highly recommended that you try the demo before buying the full game as some puzzles are a matter of timing.

There is no dialogue within the game, so captioning is irrelevant.
The game does feature the option to turn on and off gore within the game as the main character will die, and it might not be something that the player wants to see.

Overall, LIMBO is a great game for only $15, especially considering what can be had for $60.

The only place I really feel that LIMBO dropped the ball in terms of accessibility was the sound part. Visuals aren’t all that different whether the player’s able to see or not able to see. If the player knows where they’ve got to be to see the screen, they should have no problems with the game. I played through the game single-handedly with both my right and left hands and had no problems.

Hearing

Hearing plays a large role in the atmosphere of the game. Some puzzles depend on the player being able to hear to solve the puzzle. No ambient noise captioning. No dialogue to be subtitled. I do lean towards broken games getting a 1 instead of a 5, but it’s not exactly broken if you can find the answer to your problem in 5 minutes on you tube.

Recommended score: 5/10

Visual

The game is intentionally dark - using only grayscale which means that everyone will see the game basically the same. Game is intentionally hard to see. I gave the game a 9 because I don’t feel the game is at all an oversight. The experience won’t really differ from player to player like they seem to when the game tries to use all million plus colors available for use - having half a dozen or so seemed like plenty - even if they’re in the same basic part of the spectrum. There are things that could have been scaled down to make the unknown child seem bigger. Like the spiders didn’t need to be as big as they were in order to make the boy look so small. 5 or even 10% more would have been enough.

Recommended rating: 9/10

Mobility

Three button control scheme (Left Stick, “A“/“Y“ button, and “B“ button). No button remapping. Some puzzles are a matter of timing. I would have given this game a 9 except some of the puzzles are timed and button remapping could be a minor issue.

Recommended score:8/10