Deep beneath my desk lies a secret shame: impenetrable black thickets of power leads, sprouting forth across two overlapping extension units. Such a failure of cable management pierces my conscience like the beat of Poe’s tell-tale heart, and yet I’m forever powerless – as in, I can’t be bothered – to do anything about it. Yet even I was soothed by the Steam Next Fest demo for Plug It In, a chilled-out puzzle game about clicking chunky plugs into the right outlets.
For the most part, it’s just a case of matching plug shapes to corresponding sockets, and rotating the former so that all of them can fit into the confines of the funkily-shaped outlet arrays. While some cosy tunes play in the background, naturally. The highlights are the puzzles where the plugs include outlets of their own, adding a touch of three-dimensional power stacking that’s satisfying to pull off even when your construction looks like it’s one spark away from incinerating an entire postcode.
It helps that the clean, simple visuals and absolutely delicious click sound when a plug hits home make the whole thing feel like playing with building blocks. Rather than, y’know, the dusty, back-creaking tedium of sorting an extension socket in real life. My only complaint is that it’s not always obvious why a plug will refuse to seat, when there’s seemingly a good match for the connection type and no other plugs blocking its way. This happened to me on a couple of puzzles, which I eventually beat with alternative layouts, but still. What was wrong with the first one?!
Don’t let that put you off too much, though – Plug It In is a lovely, relaxing little puzzler, for neat freaks and embarrassed cable neglecters alike. You can try the demo on Steam, and there’s a browser version playable on Itch as well – though the Steam edition looks a fair bit more fleshed-out and polished.