WOODWORM? It's more like a brain worm, am I right or am I right? On my weekend scrounging through the beautiful landscapes of Itch.io I stumbled upon this little gem. It is a tiny puzzle game, a little thing to sizzle your neurons on a pan of problem-solving. An ideal morsel of fun for a mind in search of some challenge without the hassle of such nonsense like story, narrative, and character growth. Just you, your highly trained woodworm, and a shape carved in wood your amazing squishy larva needs to reproduce by happily chomping a block of wood into shape.
In theory, you can finish this game in pretty much a few minutes - there are only 17 shapes to carve and definitely no secrets to dig into. However, for most players, I'd assume it will be a bit more, wouldn't even be surprised if it can take an hour or two of bashing your head against the later challenges, as they are... Quite devious! See, the worm isn't exactly a nimble acrobat, and while it's chonky squishy body can cling to surfaces well enough it definitely ain't a jumper. So to reach the top of your block you need to climb. Which gets more and more difficult as the shapes they ask you to chomp out get more complex.

At some point, you'll realize that your mighty wood-gnawing maw can absolutely drill through the block. Creatively cutting the block into pieces and letting gravity aid you by pulling the bits down to form the desired outcome becomes a core part of the experience. And even that gets a bit more twisty and less straightforward as you progress, asking your brain to think a little bit outside the box. What path must my hungry worm take to let everything fall into place exactly as I need it to? That's the tricky part.
And so in the last five, well okay, seven puzzles I had to tap the X key quite often to reset the challenge and try it over and over again. The fun part is that it never became a source of frustration. The chill tune, and the NES aesthetics, keep me relaxed and grounded, but there was another great bit here to keep me going - each attempt felt like I found out something that worked. Sure, I might not have the desired result in the end, and had to reset, but I had those little 'aha!' moments that got my brain twist and turn the problem until it clicked. For me this is like a perfect spot for a puzzler to be at, to let you trial and error your way to a different way of looking at the problem at hand.
WOODWORM was an afternoon delight. A small, tightly designed game with a great focus on what it wants to be and offers a bite-sized bit of entertainment for a brain looking for a little workout. If puzzlers are up your alley, definitely check it out!
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