Druid is a casual puzzle adventure game, notable for its overall brevity, art style and backtracking. For nearly 2 hours, I gave this game my undivided attention as I played through it all from start to finish (including the task of collecting all of the collectables).

The atmosphere of the forest was really quite pleasant and calming, coupled with the signature theme that plays and loops the whole time you are out fossicking around for clues / items / progression. The downside to this is that there is a lot of filler / blank canvas between backtracking and there's quite a large portion of that considering how small the game actually is when all is played out. It may be a con to some, but I didn't actually mind the absence of a map. Being a Druid, this is somewhat to be expected as you are one with the earth and nature itself. Besides; with all of the aforementioned backtracking being done, you quickly learn what goes where and how shortcuts loop back around to other places. This could be improved upon, though. If you're going to make backtracking such a large part of the game, you've gotta fill up those spaces more, somehow. We want the magical Druid forest, not someone's PowerPoint presentation on the finer points of watching grass grow.

The puzzles and riddles are relatively common sense stuff, considering what you're working with. It's just a matter of putting the pieces together as you come across them, should you have the proper tools at your disposal. This, combined with the demands of the creatures who live in the forest, makes it just seem more like trivial busy work and less like a mental challenge. I found I could speed things up a bit by diagonal walking wherever I could to cover some more ground; the titular character is sadly a one speed guy and that is to say, rather slow.

Your nature runes are also hotkeyed for you, from keys 1-0. This isn't the worst design in the world but it makes interacting with everything a little clunky, especially taking into consideration some of the animations for these, as well as the sometimes overly precise points to use them. I wouldn't mind navigating through these with use of the mouse wheel for a quick scroll through the list. Though, that wouldn't save me from a bug I experienced about halfway through the game, where I got stuck on a mole hill after activating the relevant rune power for it, seizing up like I was having an epileptic fit. Thus having to quit out and back in again - thank goodness the continue function works perfectly fine.

To Druids credit, however, I did play it through without wanting to vomit or desecrate a holy place and while it wasn't the most engaging thing in the world; it was actually kind of relaxing and still offered a little something to do. I'll still slide this one over into the recommended pile on this merit. That's also considering I paid far, far less than a cup of coffee for it.

Druid is a casual puzzle adventure game, notable for its overall brevity, art style and [i] backtracking. [/i] For nearly 2 hours, I gave this game my undivided attention as I played through it all from start to finish (including the task of collecting all of the collectables). The atmosphere of the forest was really quite pleasant and calming, coupled with the signature theme that plays and loops the whole time you are out fossicking around for clues / items / progression. The downside to this is that there is a lot of filler / blank canvas between backtracking and there's quite a large portion of that considering how small the game actually is when all is played out. It may be a con to some, but I didn't actually mind the absence of a map. Being a Druid, this is somewhat to be expected as you are one with the earth and nature itself. Besides; with all of the aforementioned backtracking being done, you quickly learn what goes where and how shortcuts loop back around to other places. This could be improved upon, though. If you're going to make backtracking such a large part of the game, you've gotta fill up those spaces more, somehow. We want the magical Druid forest, not someone's PowerPoint presentation on the finer points of watching grass grow. The puzzles and riddles are relatively common sense stuff, considering what you're working with. It's just a matter of putting the pieces together as you come across them, should you have the proper tools at your disposal. This, combined with the demands of the creatures who live in the forest, makes it just seem more like trivial busy work and less like a mental challenge. I found I could speed things up a bit by diagonal walking wherever I could to cover some more ground; the titular character is sadly a one speed guy and that is to say, rather slow. Your nature runes are also hotkeyed for you, from keys 1-0. This isn't the worst design in the world but it makes interacting with everything a little clunky, especially taking into consideration some of the animations for these, as well as the sometimes overly precise points to use them. I wouldn't mind navigating through these with use of the mouse wheel for a quick scroll through the list. Though, that wouldn't save me from a bug I experienced about halfway through the game, where [spoiler] I got stuck on a mole hill after activating the relevant rune power for it, seizing up like I was having an epileptic fit. [/spoiler] Thus having to quit out and back in again - thank goodness the continue function works perfectly fine. To Druids credit, however, I did play it through without wanting to vomit or desecrate a holy place and while it wasn't the most engaging thing in the world; it was actually kind of relaxing and still offered a little something to do. I'll still slide this one over into the recommended pile on this merit. That's also considering I paid far, far less than a cup of coffee for it.