He finally reaches the end of the level to take down the flag to be greeted by hopefully the ending cutscene. He waits in awe as a dinosaur-like creature appears from the castle and speaks to him: "The princess must be in another castle. Are you sure she exists?". At that moment he knew: "Something's not quite right with the story of this game". Braid is the name of the game he found himself playing. After painstackingly gathering all the pieces of the all important jigsaws without consulting one of the greatest gaming friends anyone could have (GameFAQs), he finds himself climbing the ladder that mysteriously appeared to the final stages. Through time-reversing creatures and deadly firewalls he ran only to discover an ending so confusing it puts Hideo Kojima to shame. Atom Bomb?!

So he decides that he must write a quick review to those who have never played the game, and here is what he said.

"Braid is one of those games that you come across that you immediately say 'Wow' toward the graphics. You can see the great time and care that went on the backgrounds of every screen. But graphics aren't the important pieces of the jigsaw this game has made. At first people may think that the developer is making a 2 dimensional rip-off of the Prince of Persia Sands of Time trilogy; anyone who's played the game says it can't be further from it (excluding the fact you can reverse time). At the start it seems like a generic platformer with jigsaw pieces to collect; no Banjo, I'm not looking at you. You have to carefully manipulate the creatures and platforms in order to collect each jigsaw piece to create the fully completed picture from each level. There are 6.... uhh... 5 levels to do this with. In some cases, the pieces are actually a part of the level once you've put them in the frame.

After the first levels, each level gets its own theme or ability to go with them: such as slowing down time at a certain point or using your copycat shadow to your advantage. There are some levels that repeat themselves throughout the game (note: some) but they have to be solved in a different way each time due to the current abilities you have. Quite an interesting idea, and works well in my opinion.

The only problems I find with the game is the lack of telling you the game mechanics and the story. While getting through each level is fine, the odd jigsaw puzzle will get you stuck because you didn't know you could bounce an enemy off the top of your head. The story, seems like a very nice drawn out story about a guy who leaves the love of his life to save the princess. Slight Spoilers ahead: this is only to be turned on its head when you reach the Epilogue.

I'm not going to give any rating, as it's a stupid way to mark a game. I personally think it's a very good game, which I spent many hours trying to grab those last few jigsaw puzzles. Those that aren't so... intellectually minded... however won't be able to complete the game without a guide as you need to collect every single one to do that."

And so the next day, he leaves the new Braid in the hair of his Xbox 360 for a very old one. Or seemingly old. The character that appeared on his screen was a man among men... or robot among men, whichever story it is you read. This "Man" was a Mega Man, and the 9th one at that. No review necessary, if you've played Mega Man 1-6. If you can complete this game though, you will be a Mega Man among... well... gamers due to it's old-style difficulty. He wonders at the moment if it's just a scam and there are no bosses to fight...