Hey all. I’m back with a medieval-themed, combat-heavy puzzle game. It’s my Besiege review. Besiege has been out for a while now on the PC through Steam and other platforms. It’s slowly been making its way to other consoles and recently released for the PlayStation 4 and PlayStation 5. And it’s not like developer Spiderling Studios has been sitting on their hands either. The core game has been updated many times over the years before landing on the PlayStation.
Gameplay: This plays a lot like Abriss, which I reviewed a little while ago when it moved to the PlayStation 5 a couple months ago. In Besiege, you are tasked with building complex machines and structures to complete various missions or puzzles, which generally includes knocking down structures or plowing through enemy armies. The main difference between Abriss and Besiege is that Abriss was very modern or almost sci-fi while Besiege is generally medieval in theme. This includes both the contraptions that you will build and also the levels, or puzzles, that need to be completed.
For example, I was tasked in one early level to defeat 60 percent of the enemy army using my machine, so I built a cart with big wheels that allowed me to run over the enemy soldiers while also being steerable. Having some background with mechanics will help most players, but it is not completely impossible for those with less experience to construct things like this in Besiege. And if you get stuck, there are blueprints made and shared by other players that you can grab to help get you over a difficult level.
On the flip side, if you come up with a particularly deadly or impressive machine, you can save its blueprint, name it, and share it with the world too.
That brings me to the one glaring issue I encountered while playing Besiege, which is its marketplace. This is the spot where players can freely download other players’ constructions. The problem is that it’s poorly handled. In fact, it caused my PlayStation 5 to experience severe lag for no reason that I could see given that my internet connection was doing just fine.
Maybe it’s just the fact that the code isn’t refined enough, or there’s some sort of issue on the server-side with the PlayStation just being added to the other consoles supported. It took between eight and 10 seconds to even move the highlight from one item to another, and that is if the movement registered at all which wasn’t guaranteed.
Honestly, that one issue is why I have my score for this title’s gameplay as low as it. This is because I really enjoyed Abriss, and Besiege was shaping up to be even better with each player being able to upload their favorite builds and download other players’ builds for inspiration. Hopefully, this issue will be fixed by the time you all read this review. But if it’s not, be aware that it was that one issue that it is the main reason I’m scoring this so low.
But other than that, I really enjoyed the various puzzles that it offers. I haven’t fully completed every level yet as there are quite a few. They are all very dependent on physics, which is really great. It scratched that itch for me like when I first started playing Portal or even Red Faction. Besiege was also recently updated with a new DLC called The Splintered Sea which adds more puzzles, all of which have a nautical theme for even greater challenges.
Art: The art is clearly made to be crude on purpose. It’s a crisp sort of crude on my PlayStation 5, but it doesn’t really take advantage of the console’s power. You can tell that this title was made years ago and only recently ported to the PS5.
Music: The music is forgettable, but it is never really the highlight of a game like Besiege in the first place.
Overall: I enjoyed Besiege, but it might be worth waiting for it to be on sale if you plan on buying it on a console.
For those who like: Puzzles, Physics Puzzles, Mechanical Things, and Engineering.
Not for those who don’t like: Any of the above or extremely clunky marketplace interfaces.
Developers: Spiderling Studios
Platforms: Nintendo Switch, PC, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Steam, Xbox One, Xbox Series X