tight puzzle-platformer game with a great tile-based mechanic where the main character qbby can grow blocks out of his body to use for a variety of tasks. while initially simple, the game quickly expands qbby's mechanical vocabulary without introducing any new abilities via the wide variety of level gimmicks to overcome. qbby's blocks can be used to hold switches in place, pull qbby up to higher places, form stairs, and shield him from lasers depending on the situation, and the best puzzles in the game require designing block structures that can perform multiple functions when they interact with the environment. on the level design side, the game dips its toe into several different puzzle genres, including physics-based moving blocks, tetris-style line clearing, and lemmings=style AI manipulation, among others. the levels themselves rarely stick to one structure, veering between larger single-room puzzles and chains of short puzzles that focus on escalating a single design concept. a single idea rarely gets extended past 15 minutes of puzzle solving before something new appears, which keeps the pacing thankfully breezy.

beyond reaching the end of each level, there are also collectable crowns to look out for in each level. my first impression was that they would be like the strawberries in celeste where they function as a heightened, optional challenge, and in some levels they serve this purpose, which works amazingly well when it reveals the flexibility in approaches to each puzzle. however, in a lot of other cases they serve as a subtle guide for how to solve more abstract puzzles, which I found fascinating. to keep these crowns exclusive, the designers imposed a limit on the number of blocks you may create before the crowns are disabled, which I personally don't mind considering how generous, accurate, and quick the checkpoint reset system is.

there's also a fleeting plot that has some sort of world-actualizing consequence for the main characters; I frequently played this on the couch around my roommates and I kept looking away during the cutscenes, so I don't really have a take for what goes on other than that it's cool. the graphics are pleasingly sparse as well, and they look crisp on the 3ds screen. the music was not my cup of tea personally, given that it was mainly minimalist chiptune stuff. as a pick-up-and-play game the presentation mainly gave way to how quick it was to pick it up and work through a puzzle, even for ones that stumped me for a bit. I haven't worked through all of the post-game puzzles, but I've found the ones I've played so far to be a great challenge that capitalizes on the ideas demonstrated prior. between these games, kirby, part-time ufo, and picross 3d, HAL lab is a fascinating force in the realm of puzzle-adjacent games.