Opus Magnum is a puzzle game where you automate a machine to be able to create alchemical compounds (made up of various components you need to fuse together in specific patterns). You’re given free rein to assemble an array of parts like grabbers that can retract or expand, or rails for them to move along, or tiles that let you fuse parts together, but what makes the game really interesting is when you finally get your first machine up and running.
Once you back out to the main menu, you’re greeted by three leaderboards measuring the cost and area your machine uses, along with how many cycles it takes to create 6 copies of your product. Not to mention global and friend leaderboards for you to see just how far you are from creating something optimal. What makes this game fun isn’t just solving puzzles but optimizing them along whichever axis you prefer – because it’s almost impossible to create a machine that optimizes all three categories. This gives the game a ton of replayability, and there are even user-submitted puzzles for you to take a look at.
The actual process of creating the products you want is honestly pretty similar to coding: you give each individual piece of the puzzle instructions on what it should do to create one product. Should it turn to the left or the right? How many times? When should it grab and let go? Figuring out how to squeeze as much optimization as you can out of each part is surprisingly fun. And watching the completed machine at work is pretty soothing. The game even gives you the option to export your creations as GIF files, which is how I got my hands on the ones you see on this post.
This isn’t a game that appeals to everyone, but if it sounds interesting to you, you’ll probably really enjoy it.
References
“Opus Magnum Solution GIFs (Spoiler Heavy).” Discourse Zone, 13 June 2023, discourse.zone/t/opus-magnum-solution-gifs-spoiler-heavy/7600.