Is This Seat Taken Review - Not a Pickup Line, Just Puzzles and Accessibility
I’ll be honest. The train pulled into its last stop before the end of the level, and several shapes disembarked, and then 11 (!) rosy-cheeked child-shapes (and their teacher) rocked up wanting a ride. They also wanted many other inconvenient things, and I was like, “Oh, seriously?! Please just sit where I tell you to sit.”
I would, however, like to believe that I can be a champion for accessibility. And some of the things these shapes want are very reasonable; to be away from strong smells and loud noises, or to sleep, or to safely stow their saxophone AND their teapot in the luggage compartment. You could certainly argue that those who want to ‘steal popcorn’ may be dealing with food insecurity issues. So, fine, everyone gets what they want, no questions asked. Sometimes that’s important.
Let’s just get everyone off the train and start grouping the stinkiest children together, to create a stink-free section for the odour-sensitive. Loud people at the front, friends together, people who want to be alone go to the outer edges, backpacks next to their owners and so on. If the train is late, that’s just because I need a little more practice. Everyone will arrive with a smile, I swear it.
Think of, ‘Is This Seat Taken?’ as the place where logic meets the generous accommodating of seating requests. Character A needs X, so you place them away from Character B, who is creating Y (which is adverse to X), or next to Character C, who is providing X, but Characters A and C hate each other, so maybe only the first option works. Or Character A is feeling hot, so you turn on one air conditioner, then move all of the characters who are sensitive to cold away from the cold air tiles. Or turn on both air conditioners if there are more hot characters than cold. Or whatever. You get the idea.
The best moments are when logic intersects with characters to tell some kind of emergent story. For example, in the stadium, supporters of opposing teams are unhappy to be seated next to each other, but adjacently seated same team supporters will chant together. I realised that one character was sensitive to noise (including chanting), but will chant if placed next to a same team supporter, and so they chant miserably, annoying themself with their own resulting noise. I love that character. I would do anything for them to have a good sports spectator experience, especially when that seems impossible … Similarly, other sympathetic characters can’t see from the back rows, or from behind someone who is standing, unless they are also standing, but they can’t stand if they have a bad back, and so on.
There is one (really difficult) stadium level that I just cannot solve, possibly because of (all of the above and) the persistent mess created by popcorn. I’m still working on it. Tutorialisation, progression, user interface, and every other carefully implemented detail, do neatly support learning and play, yet some of these puzzles are really difficult. (You can skip them, but at the cost of not earning the stars that unlock special levels.) I have also not been able to solve a classroom level in which distractible students have to be seated away from their crush. Breeze has a crush on Roshan, who has a crush on Koda, who has a crush on Hiroshi, who has a crush on William, who has a crush on Nat, who doesn’t like to be copied by, or helped by, other students.
Sure, I’ll accommodate this circular nightmare of musical chairs and heartbreak, but as a teacher in real life, I have a new appreciation for my students keeping their crushes to themselves. Of course, challenging puzzle games are good, not bad. The only issue with failure is that, to go back and have another try, you have to play (usually) 4 levels in the group, and it’s mostly the last level that’s the tricky one.
If you have a love for puzzle games, ‘Is this Seat Taken?’ is for you. It respects your time, intellect, life experiences and personal preferences for odour, food, friendship and more. And it does so while making you the hero that public spaces like transport, classrooms, and stadiums need, in order to be welcoming and accessible to all people, including those who actually are just a bit (unharmfully) fussy.
Is this seat taken was reviewed on PC with code purchased by the reviewer.
