Braid trailer 1.2 from David Hellman on Vimeo.

The Humble Indy Bundle is something that’s been in my peripheral for awhile, but I haven’t been too interested in this batch until they announced the inclusion of last year’s pack as well, which includes the game Braid.

Braid, for the uninformed, is a 2D platformer where the main character has the ability to manipulate the flow of time in order to solve the game’s puzzles. The trailer for it is really impressive, but I (unfortunately) forgot about it until today’s announcement.

I haven’t had much of a chance to play much more than the initial couple of worlds, but it was well worth the cost of the bundle of games. While not as polished, the graphics have the feel of 16-bit Earthworm Jim games of yore, and plays like a decent platformer/puzzler. The character doesn’t maneuver as well as I’d like, but I suppose that’s part of the challenge.

Braid really shines the first time you have to press the Shift key and send your character moving backwards through time. The game tracks your movements through each level and reverses your player (and everything else) until you release the key, which allows for easy do-overs. Later in the game, you’ll find that some things stay put once you start moving back in time, which seems to be the main thrust of the first few puzzles. I can’t wait to see what else the game has in store.

There’s only 5 days left to purchase the Humble Bundle, so don’t waste any more time reading this and go grab a copy!