Quick Look: Stacking

Double Fine, after releasing the somewhat mixed received Brutal Legend, has concentrated its efforts on downloadable arcade titles, with the most recent one being Stacking, a rather unique title focused on Russian nesting dolls or matryoshka, as they're also known.

Double Fine made a name for itself by thinking outside the box, and Stacking is quite far out there, with the downloadable title focusing on a pretty serious story of forced child labor, but adds in a ton of hilarious mechanics and side stories.

You play as Charlie, the smallest of a family of dolls, who must go on a quest to save his bigger siblings after they were forced into various labor collectives by an oppressive ruler.

The world of Stacking is similar to a Victorian age Great Britain, with rich aristocrats enjoying the finer things in life while common folk work hard in order to keep the aforementioned rich guys happy.

The gameplay of Stacking, as its name suggests, centers on stacking yourself with larger dolls and using some of their unique abilities to overcome challenges, whether to stop labor strikes in order to get trains to work or close off restaurants to make tourists stop a cruise ship.

You need to find certain dolls in the game world with certain abilities which need to be used in the challenges that you need to overcome or to unlock new areas.

Things aren't always simple, especially as most of the challenges have multiple solutions, meaning you need to start experimenting and thinking outside the box in order to uncover all of the title's secrets.

From what I've played up until now, Stacking is a pretty unique game, which, even if it makes you raise your eyebrow in certain cases, delivers a compelling experience that motivates you to experiment with all of the dolls available.

Stacking is available as a digital download on the PlayStation Network and Xbox Live for $15 or 1200 MS Points, respectively.

Check out some gameplay of Stacking in the video below.