The Mobius Machine, Madruga Works’ first Metroidvania game, is finally here! Read our review to see what it did well, what it didn't do well, and if it's worth buying.
The Mobius Machine Review Overview
The Mobius Machine Pros & Cons
| Pros | Cons |
|---|---|
 Simple and Easy-to-Learn Metroidvania Massive Open World Good Visuals |
Frustrating Platforming Areas Some Areas Look Too Similar Progression Gets Stalled Quickly |
The Mobius Machine Overall - 64/100
The Mobius Machine is a decent metroidvania backed up with responsive controls, a massive open world, and a healthy amount of enemy variety to always keep you on your toes. The flaws in level design, gameplay, and progression haunt this game however, as while it has potential to be a great game in a loaded genre, the whole package falls flat.
The Mobius Machine Story - 5/10
The story of the game isn’t very compelling, it starts with you dreaming about the game’s concept of the repetitive nature in its intro then you end up stranded due to your space shuttle crashing into the planet while responding to a distress call. From then on, it takes a few hours to get new dialogue, but it doesn’t really clear anything up in the plot.
The Mobius Machine Gameplay - 6/10
As a metroidvania, it successfully captures that cycle of exploration, getting lost, discovery, etc. However, this experience quickly turns sour when you start backtracking in the game as you realize moving in the game is quite sluggish. Also, add in the type of level design designed to frustrate you where you’ll have to keep encountering this type of scenario a lot. It has a good foundation of controls and enemy variety, but it gets weighed down by its own flaws.
The Mobius Machine Visuals - 8/10
The game looks pretty good, it could even be said that this is its best asset to show off. It also has quite a lot of options for optimization on its settings which is a huge plus for me. There’s not a lot of things to say other than the game looks pretty good.
The Mobius Machine Audio - 5/10
The music in the game is a repetitive loop of the background music for each sector and doesn’t really strike a chord. It gets boring quite quickly and since backtracking in the game is bad, this certainly doesn’t add much to the experience. Sound effects are pretty decent, but nothing noteworthy to really write about.
The Mobius Machine Value for Money - 8/10
The game is priced at $24.99 and honestly that’s a pretty good deal. It offers you a decent experience of a metroidvania without breaking the bank, just don’t set your expectations too high. There’s potential for improvement in this game as it has a good foundation with its core design, but has some issues on the balance of convenience and reward with its exploration.
The Mobius Machine Review: Houston, We Have A Problem
I certainly didn’t expect too much from the game, but I was charmed by its aesthetic from the initial trailer that they showed a few months back. The first few hours of the game is pretty exciting as this is the part where I familiarize myself with the controls and found it pretty responsive and not clunky at all.
It’s very simple and straightforward, nothing out of the ordinary when it comes to movement and combat as it reminds me more of Mega Man or even the later Mega Man ZX series. The problems arose when it started to show that the progression in the game would slow down to a crawl as most of the time I spent playing the game was backtracking to other sectors.
I don’t consider myself a platforming expert nor a metroidvania expert, but I’ve had my fair share of games to comment on what I think works and what doesn’t. It’s good that they went for a huge interconnected map layout as opening shortcuts tend to cut a lot of time, but in my experience playing this game, it didn’t really help as much as it should’ve. The game definitely needed either more shortcuts (which might mean a whole different map layout) or more fast travel points to lessen the time it takes for you to walk around from area to area.
I had a huge problem with Sector 3, where there are two recurring stage gimmicks at play in the whole area. The first gimmick is the crumbling platform jump-a thon while being locked onto heat-seeking missiles. The second gimmick is the conveyor belt area where you enemies will spawn in the air, while you’re being blocked by a harmful object in the belt. These gimmicks gave me flashbacks to MegaMan X6, which was a very frustrating game to play mainly because of all of its stage designs and layouts. Not to mention that the enemies in Sectors 2 and 3 are way tankier than the first one, which meant that it took more time to kill the enemies while juggling annoying areas.
Overall, it’s a game with a decent foundation, but has poor map and stage layout which makes the game stale and repetitive after a few hours of gameplay. It has its enjoyable moments, but in my experience the frustrating ones outweighed it far more.
Pros of The Mobius Machine
| Things The Mobius Machine Got Right |
|---|
|
Simple and Easy-to-Learn Metroidvania Massive Open World Good Visuals |
Simple and Easy-to-Learn Metroidvania
The game isn’t all that difficult to learn as opposed to some metroidvanias that have special interactions with certain mechanics like Hollow Knight’s pogo jumping and what not. It’s very straightforward in its approach and doesn’t deviate from that formula even a few hours in. It does have Mega Man vibes with its platforming sections and Metroid Prime with its shooting mechanics which is a welcome thing to have.
Massive Open World
As a Metroidvania, the game is supposed to have an interconnected open world with its numerous areas. It succeeds in doing so as the game has more than 5 different areas to explore and get lost in. In addition to its size, areas are sprawling with different challenges be it stage gimmicks, platforming, or something of the sort.
Good Visuals
The game certainly looks good in my opinion, as it looks more of a cartoon-render with an alien theme. Enemy and character designs are also pretty swell as all of the enemies are quite distinct from each other that you can distinguish differences even if some of them are color swaps.
Cons of The Mobius Machine
| Things That The Mobius Machine Can Improve |
|---|
|
Frustrating Platforming Areas Some Areas Look Too Similar Progression Gets Stalled Quickly |
Frustrating Platforming Areas
After a few hours in, I found myself looping in a considerably difficult sector as the platforming section is both frustrating and quite challenging. The harsh part is that platforming is dominant in most parts of each sector, which means if you hate platforming or get frustrated easily with the Mega Man-esque levels where enemies are trying to hit you while you’re jumping around, you will not like this game quite a bit.
Some Areas Look Too Similar
With the game being quite huge in scale, there were a lot of times where I had to stop and look at the map if I had already been through the same place as before. A lot of areas in the game tend to look quite similar and this might throw you off when you start to backtrack to find certain items and upgrades.
Progression Gets Stalled Quickly
A few hours in the game, you receive the Thruster upgrade which allows you to dash quickly to get past certain areas in the game. The next upgrade doesn’t come at the same amount of time it took for me to find the Thruster, and this was apparent way later when I was backtracking different sectors at a time. This became another point of frustration as the gameplay quickly became repetitive as I was just backtracking for the most part in the latter half of my playthrough.
Is The Mobius Machine Worth It?
Decent, But Not Something I’d Recommend
For a Metroidvania, The Mobius Machine is a pretty decent game to play. While most of the issues that I ran into could be attributed to skill issues with platforming and experience with metroidvanias, I can’t recommend this game over other great metroidvanias like Hollow Knight, Bloodstained, and the like.
| Digital Storefronts | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 Steam |
 Xbox |
 PlayStation |
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| $24.99 | |||||
The Mobius Machine Overview & Premise
You find yourself in a vast alien world that’s filled with deadly fauna and malfunctioning machines. Explore the planet and its land, seas, and skies, and discover its secrets. You decide how you traverse the open world around you. Stay safe and escape in one piece.
The Mobius Machine FAQ
What are the System Requirements to play The Mobius Machine for PC?
The System Requirements are as follows:
| Specifications | Minimum | Recommended |
|---|---|---|
| OS | Windows 10 or above | |
| Processor | Core i5 | |
| Memory | 8GB RAM | |
| Graphics | DirectX 11 compatible with support for Shader Model 5.0 and 1GB VRAM | AMD or NVIDIA card |
| Direct X | DX11 | |
| Storage | 3 GB | |
The Mobius Machine Product Information
 |
|
| Title | THE MOBIUS MACHINE |
|---|---|
| Release Date | March 1, 2024 |
| Developer | Madruga Works |
| Publisher | Madruga Works |
| Supported Platforms | PC, PS5, Xbox Series X|S |
| Genre | Metroidvania, Action, Adventure |
| Number of Players | 1 |
| ESRB Rating | E10+ |
| Official Website | The Mobius Machine Website |
