Reflection of Mine

Reflection of Mine is a fun, yet challenging, puzzle game that explores Lilly Wichgan’s mental personality disorder. Right at the beginning of the game we are told by our psychologist, Tom, that we have burned a church down, witnessed a murder, and escaped an insane asylum. After more backstory and a brief cutscene plays out giving us more details about Lilly Wichgan, we discover that she has a bad personality that is nearly the opposite of who she really is.

Once the intro has played out, we are presented with the level selection menu. The game has four worlds with only one unlocked at first and 12 levels per world. After finishing about half of each world the next one unlocks. After finishing all the levels to each world or area there are 4 secret hidden keys in each area that are also designated on the menu, so no hunting is required. The puzzles are quite easy at first and then spike in difficulty when after a few levels we are introduced to moving enemies within the first world (the forest). The puzzles in this area are the hardest in the game in my opinion due to the timing required to get by without dying.

We control both characters, one on each side of the screen, and your objective is to safely get both of Lilly’s personalities on the left and right side of the screen to their mirror sigils to leave. The puzzles involve moving one into a wall while you move the other around obstacles without killing both characters.

Reflection of Mine also has three difficulties which changes gameplay slightly. The easiest being Phobia, this allows more freedoms such as destroying obstacles in the way. The normal setting is called Hysteria and it’s recommended to play on this setting since you can obtain a one hundred completion rating for your save. The hardest difficulty is called Neurosis and requires you to beat the game to even play it and really is a challenge. The difficulty only allows so many steps per level and there are no in game checkpoints.

Fortunately, the achievements for this game are quite simple and follow the Ratalaika formula for easy Gamerscore. The developers were nice enough to not even require you to beat the secret levels in the Forest area, which again is the hardest area in the game thanks to movable enemies that are on a timed path. All the achievements can be obtained by beating all 12 levels in the first three areas and collecting all the keys to unlock the two bonus levels per each area. The only bonus levels you have to beat are The Hotel’s and The Church’s levels since they provide more background and closure on Lilly’s personalities.

Again, Reflection of Mine is a simple puzzle game that allows hints to be used and can be earned by playing a short minigame after dying so many times on a level. That’s right, if you die a lot, they give you the opportunity to earn hints which show you where to move on screen via a ghost moving around before Lilly. You can also find guides online that tell you the correct input if that’s how you prefer it. I would highly recommend a text guide over a video guide since the gameplay is entering commands, such as moving: left, right, up or down.

If you manage to get one of the personalities killed by a moving enemy or a well-placed spike that character will die and you’ll be sent back to the most recent checkpoint (not all levels have checkpoints, but most of the hard ones do). Each death scene is unique depending on which character dies.

The controls are quite simple: X is for your ability which will change throughout the game, analogue stick or d-pad to move in the four main directions, and B is used to zoom out for a better look at the puzzle. The graphics aren’t much to look at, though there is a setting for adding a camera effect which adds static to the visuals, but I opted out of that. The developers do make use of certain colors to help bring the characters to life more, such as the end game area being white and grey until you consume the pills which are a part of the puzzles and everything changes to a more colorful puzzle design. The game uses the top down perspective that popular top down RPG’s use such as Pokémon, but is simply a puzzle game.

Later on, as you progress through each area you delve deeper into Lilly’s mind and see her struggle with control and her memories. The deeper you go, the more personalities you will meet. Some are selfish and some are kind, one happens to be a demon and the opposite a saint. Redblack Spade put effort into continuing to provide a challenge through each puzzle as they introduce different mechanics which change how the puzzles work in each area. They also ensure that it’s unique to each personality for that area.

In the first area we are taught the ability of reversing time in levels which can help dodge enemies if used properly. The second area of the game introduces keys and the moving enemies disappear until end game, while the third area allows us to use crosses to either create or destroy columns that may be needed or not needed to help save our characters as we move them through the puzzle. The personalities change with each area and in between each level we get a diary page which provides more information on each character. In the first area, we are reading Lilly’s diary and then later on Emily’s diary. For the third are we read Karen’s diary and the asylum we read Ashley’s diary. Each one of those personalities is equipped with another half that we get to learn about as you progress.

The audio throughout wasn’t ground breaking, but certainly did help add to the dark and gloomy atmosphere. Each area had a unique song that would play while solving levels and also unique in between level music as you progress and talk to NPC’s. The main menu theme is the weakest of the bunch, but at least the in-game music adds to the quality. The sound and visual aesthetics of the game certainly align themselves with more gothic themes.

Conclusion

Redblack Spade didn’t hold back when it came to adding details to our characters through the game and this was complimented by an interesting story with challenging puzzles that continuously evolved. I must be honest and confess that I had low expectations after watching the trailer of the game, but I was wrong to hold that judgement. Reflection of Mine provided a unique challenge with a very detailed and interesting story. The game takes roughly 1-2 hours if you’re using a guide or hints heavily, but I played for roughly four hours and earned all 11 achievements for 1000 Gamerscore and obtained an in-game completion percentage of 70% on the Hysteria difficulty. The completion can be earned though on easy making it less of a challenge. I don’t see myself making my way back to play this game again anytime soon after finishing it, but the extra levels are still there for me to play for a challenge. I really enjoyed playing through the challenging puzzles that continued to evolve with difficulty as I progressed through each area. If it weren’t for the hints however, I probably would have been discouraged to push through. Fortunately, Ratalaika has another easy game out there now for achievement and puzzle lovers. Reflection of Mine was quite average, but fun for being a puzzle game.

This game was reviewed based on Xbox One review code, using an Xbox One console. All of the opinions and insights here are subject to that version. Game provided by publisher.