Tandem: A Tale of Shadows Review

Introduction

By Monochrome Paris, Tandem: A Tale of Shadows was released digitally in October 2021 and is a puzzle platformer that’s split into five worlds. Help Emma and her teddy bear friend, Fenton search the dangerous and creepy worlds for Thomas Kane, the only son of the well-known Kane Illusionists, who has gone missing.

Review

Set in the Victorian era of London, England, Emma is walking the streets when she sees a carriage pass by and a teddy bear falls out. Fenton, the teddy bear quickly jumps to his feet and takes off after the carriage, Emma makes a split second decision to go after Fenton in his race to save Thomas Kane, who has been kidnapped.

Emma must conjure all her courage to help Fenton in his search for Thomas. They must work in tandem to solve puzzles and find their way through.

This game was so much fun. With 48 levels, the beautifully coloured, clear graphics and suspenseful music set the tone perfectly for this adventure, as Emma and Fenton move through each world searching for Thomas.

Each enemy was creepier than the last, and the perfect obstacle to block the path to the gem, which you collect at the end of each level to make up a key that takes you to the next world. However, before you can enter the next world, you have to endure and beat a boss; which mainly consists of running, dodging, hiding or other such stressful measures to make it through.

The puzzles get harder as you go though the story with even more obstacles for both Emma and Fenton. Fenton is in an alternate dimension and each side has its own unique challenges to conquer to move forward. So interesting and such a great idea.

There’s a well balanced mix of puzzle to platforming and, even though some puzzles took me longer to solve than others, I was fully immersed throughout, determined to help Emma and Fenton find their way to Thomas. There are even timed puzzles, which were pretty stressful, but so fun; if there is such a thing as a fun kind of stressful.

As you make your way through the 19th victorian manor in search of Thomas, there are a number of secrets to uncover, which were interesting and added more fun to the process.

The bosses themselves, who guard the gate to the next world, were incredibly creepy and so much fun to beat.

Everything about this game was so well done, the creepy music which added to the dangerous atmosphere, to having to be so reliant on lamps for light source, to having to aid Fenton in navigating the darker, creepier other dimension using shadow light.

I was a little surprised at the end of the game, it took an unexpected turn which was the cherry on this 5 tier cake of deliciousness.

Rating

Pros:

Good story
Challenging but fun puzzles
Good graphics and colours

Cons:

Sometimes the controls seemed a little buggy
The subtitles weren’t always in sync with the speech

Summary

Really interesting, fun puzzle game using shadow and light within two dimensions with Emma and Fenton having to work together to move forward.

Pretty short; at approximately 4-5 hours to finish the game and approximately 7-10 hours to platinum. I definitely recommend playing to experience the challenging yet intricate puzzles and the intriguing story.

Physical release date is on 25 March 2022.

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Game & Developer Information

Developer Website: Monochrome Paris
Developer Socials: Twitter
Publisher Website: Hatinh Interactive
Publisher Socials: Twitter
PSN Store Links: £19.99/€24.99 Europe / $24.99 North America
Trophy Information: 25. 1 / 7 / 11 / 6