Cube Escape: Birthday appears to be a direct sequel to Rusty Lake Hotel: it starts with the endless elevator scene that Rusty Lake Hotel ended with. You play as Dale Vandermeer (any relation to the Vanderbooms, I wonder?), who is transported back to his memory of his 9th birthday. Dale’s birthday includes several ominous moments and ends in a massacre. However, if Dale can figure out just the right things to do, he can change his past and prevent the tragedy.

This one was more violent than I expected, although I appreciated that the developer didn’t kill the cat. Actually, for the most part this developer tends to go out of its way to not harm animals in its games. I can only think of two, at the moment, where animals were harmed: Rusty Lake Hotel and Cube Escape: Seasons.

This entry in the series was a bit weird (they all are, I guess) - I’m still not sure whether Dale actually changed the past, or just his memories of the past. The puzzles were pretty good and, for the most part, made sense to me. The only one that I hated was the poster puzzle. Even after I figure out what I was supposed to do, I hated having to do it - it’s not really difficult, but you do need to be able to think fast and have halfway decent reflexes.

The story was excellent, almost as interesting an entry in the series as Rusty Lake: Roots. I loved the “travel back to the past to fix the past” aspect, which seems to be a recurring theme in this series. Oh, and the code from Rusty Lake Hotel reveals a little scene that provides a bit more information on one character (who I hadn’t even realized was a recurring character).

(Original review posted on A Library Girl's Familiar Diversions.) ( )