Physics-based puzzlers seem to roll in and out of popularity like the tide. One minute there’s Portal, trailblazing puzzles and wit, then there’s Superliminal for the visual effects crowd. Then there’s Viewfinder, covering the serene art fans, amongst a sea of others. To which we can now add Yerba Buena, weird name and all.
Another take on moving fixings about to create paths, Yurba Buena adds a different take rather than straightforward object manipulation. Instead, we’re going for the movement and trajectory of objects to put to use. It sounds weird, but we’ll get into that.
Is it fun, another puzzler with a wacky story to add to the annals? Or is it something that needs sinking into the San Francisco Bay? Let’s find out.
Oscillator In Distortion
Normally I’d start a review with the plot/narrative motivation of a game. This time around, I’m going to get right into the type of game Yurba Buena is. I feel this important to clarify before people see the oscillator and think, “Ah yes, this is a Portal rip-off”.
Barb’s “magic gun” that we’ll get to doesn’t move objects, as such. It moves the properties of an object, by infusing it with that of another. Make sense? No, okay, allow me to break it down thusly:
You’re facing north, there’s a ledge too high to your left, a block on the right hand side of the screen. But instead of something easy and bland like move the block, here’s where it gets different. Behind this tableau, on the road, are cars moving westwards, if you’re still with me.
What the oscillator does is take the movement of the car, store it, then project it to the block. This then moves the block across the screen, to the required ledge. Did that sound convoluted? Well, for me it was at first, but we’ll get to why it works a bit later on.
Barb, Bikers, Buildings and Bugs
So, how does this all come together in the first place? Well, our adventure is not set in some far off land, or somewhere made up entirely. There is actually a place called Yerba Buena Island, off the coast of mainland San Francisco. Furthermore, Yerba Buena was the original name for San Francisco, named after a tea-making herb. Yes, the game is literally named after where it’s set, that’s the… joke?
Anyway, it’s 1976, everyone loves chilling in Yerba Buena, but that’s all about to change. One of those out of touch fat cats wants to turn the local park into something corporate, already setting that local heroes vibe.
But that’s the back drop. What actually happens is Barb, our hero, gets caught up in a kidnapping that involves bikers and a mysterious suitcase. Not only that, the world keeps glitching as often as it rains, and the locals react to it as if they’ve just hung the washing out and a downpour is about to start.
Anyway, Barb cracks open the suitcase to find the oscillator, a device that looks like a mashed up camcorder and a satellite dish in one. What starts off as a simple saves the day mission soon becomes much, much weirder. A bit like it did in Deliver At All Costs, strangely enough
A Hop, Skip And A Torn Foundation
If that setup sounds a little vague, that’s all really Yerba Buena needs to get going. The missions follow a linear beat, separated as puzzle rooms rather than a larger playground. Barb will comment on invisible walls if players go too far, essentially confining us to solve what’s in front of us.
Fortunately the world is colourful and bright, if a little limited on colour palette. The objects that can be manipulated are highlighted under the oscillator’s cursor, which again is limited. Oh yes, Yerba Buena won’t let you mess the properties of everything up. There are limitations when it comes to breaking the world.
What does help is being able to scan the environment, which highlights what can be manipulated, and what properly can be “loaded” into the oscillator. So if you see a large, vertcal platform and a fan next to it, one can absorb the rotational properties of the fan and rotate said platform.
It’s pretty inventive, as core mechanics go. I did hit a few noodle-scracthers along the way, but sometimes it takes a minute. Barb will occasionally get reminders in her ear about the general gist, but it doesn’t put a God of War Ragnarok. There’s no spelling it for the player in layman’s terms, which was annoying when Atreus kept doing it.
My Whole Life, Flipped Upside Down
What does grate, after a fashion, is the overall tone and its tropes it falls into. What I mean to say, is that Yerba Buena is not as clever or subversive as it thinks it is. For one, the whole “down with the man” setup as the start is very laid on thick. We love our community, down with profit, hooray for San Francisco’s hipster scene wears thin early on. As does Barb and the “Woe is me” angle right from the off.
There’s also a few meta jokes that fall flat too. For one, the biggest eye roll early on for me was a character called Tee. He is called as such because he’s an NPC that’s been stuck in a T-pose for a week. Yes, that is the joke, let’s ignore the real world implication of how mental that is. It sorts of ties in with this semi-realisation, “Do they know they’re in a game?” vibe, as they react to glitches like it’s something we all experience. Like people who immediately quote The Matrix when they experience deja vu.
My only real gripes, gameplay-wise, is that it can feel very janky and clumsy at times. There were a few moments where I’d fall off a ledge, not high enough to die, but instead be walled out and have to backtrack a lot. Sure, one could call that user error, But if you want me to focus on this particular puzzle, don’t make me lose patience by pushing me back five minutes at a time.
Not Worth The Space In Time
Sadly, I didn’t come away from Yerba Buena with a gleaming review. I wanted, I love a good puzzler, like Superliminal. But unlike that, or the mighty Portal, Yerba Buena feels like it can ride its gimmick and self-referential tone all the way to the bank.
The ideas are there, and if you do like a good lateral thinking puzzle, then you might enjoy this. The brightness and quirk seperates it from some of the more dour games out there, but for me, it just didn’t stick the landing.
Does it all turn out to be a video game? Do the hipsters overthrow The Man and keep their turf? Who knows, probably. I just didn’t feel that enthused to want to keep going, and that’s a shame.
Yerba Buena is available now on PlayStation 5 (review platform), Xbox Series S|X and PC via Steam.
Developer: Mad About Pandas
Publisher: Focus Entertainment