The Package

The Package. It’s a simple title, but an apt one, because this game is strictly about one thing: a package. Your job is to move the package from Point A to Point B, utilizing a variety of gizmos and gadgets. The resultant game is a physics-based puzzle requiring strategy, a keen eye, and a healthy dose of trial and error.

Each level takes place in an industrial-looking room. You begin with two things: the door where the package will appear and the door where it needs to go. Scattered throughout the room are various features—shelves, platforms, and so on—that affect your progress. You have at your disposal a predetermined collection of “widgets.” These gadgets include conveyor belts, wind turbines, boxing gloves, and more, and you’re always given enough tools to complete the task…the trick is piecing them together properly! You can move widgets freely throughout the room with your finger. When you think you’ve got the solution, press the green Play button, and the package will appear…from there, your widgets will do their work, punching and lifting and prodding the package along its course.

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You get more points for a quickly-completed level. There are also gold bars scattered throughout the level, and if you manage to hit them with the package you’ll get extra points.

The game as a whole is very fun, though very challenging. It requires some creative thinking and a good amount of guesswork to get the widgets in just the right position to nudge the package to its final destination. Often, you’ll know what the solution ought to be, but positioning the widgets is the difficult part.

Though there are “only" twenty levels included, it’ll take you some time to work out all the solutions. (If you get too frustrated, YouTube walkthroughs are available.) The graphics are excellent and the sound effects are good, too. The game claims that it’s optimized for the iPhone 3GS, but it runs wonderfully on my second-generation iPod Touch. The Package is hard, but the experience is a rich and oftentimes rewarding one.