Crew 167: The Grand Block Odyssey Review for Steam

Crew 167: The Grand Block Odyssey was developed and published by indie game studio, oddbreeze, and released onto the Steam platform on April 8^th, 2020. Crew 167: The Grand Block Odyssey combines an addictive (though sometimes frustrating) strategy game format with the science fiction, climate fiction, and psychological thriller genres. The game is a puzzle and strategy game in terms of game play, but features an interesting enough plot that incentivizes players to see the game through to the end.

There are two main conflicts which drive the plot of the game: climate change and the battle that the main character, Crew 167, is having within himself. The game starts in a space ship where Crew 167 is the sole human traveler, accompanied only by artificial intelligence. His previous planet of inhabitance, Source, is dying because of overpopulation and radiation (sound familiar?). Crew 167 recalls things such as limited resources, extreme heat, and limitations on going outside. Stressed by the effects of the planets downfall and possibly some other factor, Crew 167 agrees to have an implant inserted, which monitors his emotions and protects him from his own fears and trauma, and to scope out the planet Hope 9 as a possible substitute planet. The problem is that Crew 167 begins to have hallucinations of objects, blocks to be specific, which act as obstacles for him. He then sets out on a quest to find out both what is going on with his implant and mind, and whether the new planet, Hope 9 is safe or not, all while encountering these boxes along the way.

To simplify the objective of the mini-games that players must defeat in order to proceed with the storyline, all you have to do is kick the block or blocks into the matching space or spaces. There are several objects in the room which you must get your box around to ensure it reaches its space, so you will have to strategize to keep your box from ending up in a corner, where you can’t kick it anymore. However, do not underestimate the importance of skill in this game, it isn’t all just strategy. It seems easy enough at first but, as with most puzzle games, this simple task becomes more complicated as you progress through the game.

For example, early in the game you start to get boxes that can only be kicked a certain amount of times, meaning they have to be in place on your last kick. Another early added complication that caused me to have to restart so many times are the boxes with timers on them, which disappear when time runs out and never come back, meaning whenever you kick a timed box into a place, that’s how much time you have to finish the entire level. The “skill” you will need is the ability to move directly behind and kick your boxes in the right direction quickly. I don’t know if it is any different on a desktop or with a mouse, but it definitely is not as simple as it sounds if you play using your laptop keypad with no mouse like me. Luckily, there are infinite retries and you can reset a challenge at any time during your attempt by clicking and holding “R”. There are also setting changes that can make the game easier for you, but just know that there is only so much the game can help you with!

8/10

Check Out the Crew 167: The Grand Block Odyssey Trailer:

Crew 167: The Grand Block Odyssey is available for Windows PC for $17.99 via Steam.