Flock!

Flock! has a truly innovative aesthetic. Its environments, composed largely of what look to be pieces of fabric stitched together, draw inspiration from recent titles like LittleBigPlanet and Banjo Kazooie: Nuts & Bolts. Meanwhile, the terrific soundtrack manages the tricky feat of melding Men in Black-style otherworldly ditties with folksy acoustic guitar. And if Flock!'s look and feel doesn't grab you, its cleverly accessible puzzles probably will. The first few require players to do little more than move a thumbstick to maneuver their flying saucers over flat fields, but before you know it you'll be contending with springboards, mud, tractor beams, locked gates, and bails of hay. Indeed, things become challenging enough that gold rankings will be few and far between in the game's later puzzles.

The only thing keeping Flock! from achieving truly great puzzle game status is that you can never turn off the beam of light that herds the animals. If you've accidentally herded your flock too far in one direction you'll need to detour around the animals and give them a wide berth, or the beam will cause the livestock to run off in all directions. Other than this one, unfortunately vexing problem, Flock! is fantastic.