The Talos Principle

Not sure if I’m as far as you, but I have at least been in the tower. The gameplay is… fine. Sometimes fun. But I’m coming back to it between other games because I want to know if the setting and theme and allegory pay off. I guess if they don’t I’ll be disappointed I sunk so much time into it. But for now I’m cautiously optimistic.

There’s a good chance you’re farther. I’ve only completed 6 of the areas in the first hall, so when I say I unlocked world B, I only mean that I could go in there any time I want now, not that I have.

Certainly I hope there is a payoff to the allegory. Given the obvious understanding and depth to the theming, this is no mere surface level skin job, I believe that it will. It seems just to carefully crafted, too multilayered, for them not to pay attention to the importance of sticking the landing. That they pull such a deep cut from Greek mythos for the naming, one supremely appropriate, they have earned my trust. I’ve bought in, and am invested in seeing where it goes.

If it falls apart when I get to the tower I expect my reaction will be strongly negative though. Expectations have been set.

As far as the mechanics, well I’ve always liked puzzles. So a good brain bender works for me. If it were just that I would play on and off and certainly feel I got my moneys worth. But the themeing of philosophy and religion has pushed this to the top of my queue right now.

The setting/theme/allegory pay off in spades. As long as you are paying attention to the terminals and audio recordings, it makes for a very complete (and even moving) experience. Note: The terminals have LOTS of extra text written as hexadecimal. This is not essential to read but is kind of interesting. I used an online hex translator on my second monitor that I could type stuff into (since you can’t copy and paste).

As far a stars: There are several endings. One of them requires all of the stars. One requires a majority of stars. Getting the stars tend to be the most interesting puzzles as they require a lot of abstract thought.

Oh, dang, that hexidecimal stuff is meaningful, huh? Iiiiinteresting…

Here’s the tool I used: https://www.branah.com/ascii-converter

Type your hex into the second box and it’ll automatically translate as you type. Doesn’t need spaces or 0x.

Also, if I’m on your friends list in Steam, you might see messages in your game from me.

See I wasn’t sure if it was, and since I’m preparing for a trip I didn’t take the time to find out.

To the log book! (thanks for confirming what I only suspected)

I started playing this for the first time today after picking it up on sale. I think I completed worlds 1,2, and 3. Getting a star on 3 because that was the first one I realized had stars. I unlocked door A and one of the pedestal objects in the main hallway.

So far I’m enjoying the puzzles even though they have been pretty easy. My guess is that things keep getting more difficult. I glanced at some of the comments above and I’m not getting into the story as much as you guys even though I find it somewhat interesting so far. Probably because I’m rather simple and not prone to deep thought :-)

So far the puzzles are like simple cousins of Portal.

The puzzles get pretty intricate. Make sure you read the log entries and listen all of the audio journals you find. That’ll give you plenty of story - no need to dig into the hex unless you’re a super nerd. The puzzle pieces are color coded (red are most hard) and stars usually require abstract thinking. Many of the puzzles make the hardest Portal puzzles seem simple - the difficulty ramps way up.

I think I got like 3-4 stars only :(. But I got at least the “true” ending.

I’m embarrassed by how long it took me to solve the puzzle where it said not to let the beams cross. I knew it couldn’t be too complicated based on the area, but it took me a while to see it.

Perhaps you didn’t realize this when trying to get stars:

Hint for some stars, no specific solutions

Many star puzzles require you to combine components between multiple puzzles. That might be smuggling parts out, or launching beams toward other puzzles.

Also, it’s worth using a guide so you can complete everything if you’re stuck. There’s story bits you likely didn’t see.

Thanks for the spoiler, it is exactly what I suspected, though I have still had no success actually getting something like that done for the ones where it seems like the intention!

I knew that, I noticed how in some areas
stars

of a specific puzzle you could see a light transmitter or any other piece like that of another puzzle area, enabling the possibility of avoiding the barrier that separates every puzzle. For example in one of the hubs with the Egyptian theme there is a light connector in the top of a obelisk, and it isn’t “unrelated” to any normal puzzle, and it happens to have direct lint of sight from a specific place in a specific puzzle, it’s clear you have to direct a light there to take a star.

The problem is that most star puzzles are a notch above red puzzles, and red puzzles were at the limit of what my puny brain is capable of handling :P.

What do you mean by “dig into the hex?”

Some messages that you find have hex values in them. You can translate them to what character they correspond to to get the full message. So far I haven’t bothered.

Seriously?

Ha! I am on the last puzzle and I hadn’t noticed that.

The difficulty is really all over the place. I’m in the B section now. So far for the most part each puzzle in the game has been pretty easy to solve, but then there have been a handful that have really stumped me. I’m on one now that I just don’t see how I can make use of the 3 jammers to get to the end. I fall 1 door short. There definitely isn’t a smooth difficulty curve from puzzle to puzzle. I wonder how much of this is due to our individual biases. I wonder how many of these puzzles that have stumped me have been a breeze for others and ones that have been easy for me have stumped others.

I’m so tempted to cheat on this puzzle but I really want to figure it out.

When using multiple jammers, remember you can shuttle them through. For example, say if there are 4 force fields in a row, you can get through all 4 with only 2 jammers. Jammer 1-> Door 1, Carry Jammer 2 and point backwards at Door 1, Carry Jammer 1 and point at Door 2, repeat.

If you need more help than that, let me know which puzzle it is and I can try to give you a hint.

Thanks. Yep, I’ve realized that and that was part of this puzzle. For this one I had actually solved it but didn’t realize it! I walked back through the puzzle and got the piece.

I had a fun moment with my son (who’s 8). I was trying to solve one of the early fan puzzles where there are like 7 of them. I couldn’t figure out how to interrupt the blue light beam and get to the other area in time. My son wanted me to do something just for fun. After another 30 minutes or so his ‘just for fun’ idea triggered an idea for me on how to solve the puzzle and it was the solution. If he hadn’t wanted to do something just for fun it probably would have taken me much longer.

I’m towards the end of the B level and solved the regular puzzles without resorting to walk throughs. I’ve probably done 50% of the stars on my own and at least got a starting hint for the other stars. Some of those are brutal and I never would have gotten them.