Remember those happy-ending fairy tales your mother used to tell you? Well, your mama was feeding you sugar-coated rehashes of the original morbid tales. Grimm, the mischievous protagonist of this episodic platform game, wants to set the record straight—and he’s using his soot-spreading powers to do it.

As Grimm, you’ll plunge a bright, carefree world into darkness.

To begin each episode, Grimm narrates a puppet show version of a fairy tale as it has traditionally been told. The snarky commentary grants these sequences undeniable charm, which is further enhanced by the simple character models and animation. The pastel colors and blocky figures make the game look like a storybook illustration come to life.

Next, we set foot in the game world to wander as Grimm and spread darkness through the lands. Running around the level automatically changes the surrounding environment from light to dark. We turned playgrounds into graveyards and bright forests into nightmarish death traps, progressing Grimm’s Dark-o-Meter until we reached a certain goal. The more darkness we spread, the more influence our avatar had over the environment.

The gameplay does get repetitive, however—we did nothing more complicated than a combo of timed platform jumps. By the end of each episode, we were tired of running around without facing any real challenge, although the varied locales (such as the wolf’s stomach from “Little Red Riding Hood”) kept the game interesting. The minimal gameplay demands are better suited for younger players, but the game is rated M, and the dead children and liberal use of blood are clearly inappropriate for youngsters.

Episodes of Grimm are free on the day they are released on GameTap. If you have half an hour to spare, the puppet-show segments alone are worth the download.

American McGee's Grimm

Enchanted

Humorous voice-acting; creative art style; just the right length.

Ever After

Simple, repetitive action; gameplay unchallenging.

VERDICT www.gametap.com

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