Beauty may be in the eye of the beholder, but it's hard to imagine any beholder finding Trine to be anything but beautiful. Few 2D platformers have been rendered with this kind of visual grace. Elegant backgrounds bring Trine's fairy tale to life: Rays of golden light stream through dreamy forests, giant mushrooms glow as if lit from within, and ivy and brambles climb the walls of crumbling fortresses. This is the kind of world we imagined when we read storybooks and dreamed of far-off kingdoms and enchanted woodlands as children. A narrator intones each chapter in a soothing baritone and a glockenspiel chimes, setting the stage for a dreamy journey through a magical landscape.
The journey is not nearly as resplendent as the paradise crafted around it, but it is great fun nonetheless. Trine is a side-scrolling action platformer that can be played on your own, as well as with one or two friends in local co-op. If you play on your own, you switch among three different characters at any given time. Playing as the thief, you shoot arrows and swing about using your grappling hook (always a joy). As the knight, you bash skeletons and bats with your sword, though you won't be limited to just that weapon by the time Trine comes to an end. The wizard is the trickiest of the three. When easing into his velvet boots, you can create boxes and platforms out of thin air and move objects around telekinetically, but you don't have any immediate offensive skills--though it can be great fun to crush enemies by conjuring a box above their heads and letting it fall on them.
When you play on your own, only the character you directly control appears on the screen, and you leap, swing, and float your way from left to right, puzzling over how to get to your destination while bashing on the baddies that would hinder you. You need the abilities of each character to progress; as the thief, the grappling hook comes in mighty handy, while the wizard's conjurations are a real boon. You need the knight from time to time as well, and not always just to slice up skeletons. Often, there are multiple ways to move forward. You may be able to stack some boxes and planks as the wizard to bridge the necessary gaps, but the thief's hook may make swinging across the simpler solution. Either way, the platforming is slick and satisfying. There are obstacles to overcome--spikes, moving platforms, giant swinging axes, and so on--but the platforming isn't very challenging. Nevertheless, great animations and tight controls make jumping and swinging feel silky smooth.
Likewise, the combat is straightforward but enjoyable. When controlling the knight, fighting is mashy in a Diablo kind of way, but its simplicity feels like it fits within the equally simple story of a mysterious magical artifact and the three unlikely heroes it binds together. There is a helpful but rudimentary leveling-up system where you can upgrade the skills and combat prowess of your heroes. However, you may find yourself occasionally wishing that undead archers would stop respawning and bats would stop fluttering around you so that you can leave combat behind and get to the more clever parts of the game. That's because Trine's best bits revolve around using physics to solve the simple puzzles that stand in the way of progress. This often involves using the wizard to swing suspended platforms to and fro; spin large wheels; and, in later levels, hop on floating platforms and mentally move them--and yourself--to your destination. But as with other games based around physics-oriented puzzles (Little Big Planet springs to mind), you'll need to put up with some annoyances. For example, jumping on a big wheel and spinning it around using telekinesis isn't always as easy as you'd like, so things can get fiddly. This wouldn't be much of an issue if the wizard had unrestricted use of his abilities, but his limited energy bar means that you could come up against a literal wall when you run out of juice and have to run back to the previous checkpoint to replenish it.
Small annoyances aside, Trine encourages you to throw ideas against it to see if they stick. Simply fooling around with the physics can be enjoyable enough on your own, but it's even better when you add one or two other players into the mix. The levels of fun rise when you have three players on the screen, with each controlling a different hero. Here, the game takes on a distinct Lost Vikings vibe because you have to ensure that each character can overcome obstacles, though the puzzles won't tax your brain. It's still really enjoyable to mess with the hanging platforms or jump on a plank and ask the wizard to ferry you across a chasm, using teamwork to make your way through the levels. Puzzle-solving is even more enjoyable here than in the PC version, which allowed one player to switch places with another in three-player co-op and permitted you to essentially cheat your way through a level. If your idea of co-op fun is to cause grief for your teammates, it can be even more enjoyable to push them into a wall of spikes or do something else that is funny and counterproductive. Unfortunately, developer Frozenbyte didn't learn its lesson regarding the PC version's buried cooperative options. Trine allows players to drop in and out at will, which is a welcome feature, but there is no onscreen prompt, menu option, or any other hint as to the existence of co-op play. Again, players who don't know of the feature are unlikely to stumble across its presence, which is a real shame.
Trine is undoubtedly beautiful, and that beauty will draw you in from beginning to end. The visual magic doesn't translate into equally superb gameplay, though the action and platforming are smooth and rewarding on their own--a few minor rough patches aside. There are reasons to return after your initial five-hour play-through, including hidden secrets and, of course, terrific cooperative action, which makes the $19.99 price easy to swallow. Trine is a fun and beautiful game that delivers a lively and refreshing jaunt through a spellbinding kingdom where fairy tales really do come true.
