Bag It! Preview

When I was a much younger lad, I worked briefly as a grocery clerk. As you might imagine, it was a job that led to a lot of packed groceries. In fact, after a few months on the job, I got so good at it that I had a hard time letting other people pack my groceries for me. To this day, I have friends and family that make me cringe every time I watch them put cleaning supplies in with fresh produce, or a pot roast in with a bag of chips. Bag It!, the upcoming iOS debut from Hidden Variable Studios, is a puzzle game that celebrates my particularly unique skill set.

By
Share this
  • Share this on Facebook
  • Share this on Twitter

Bag It! asks you to puzzle out the best way to pack your groceries later this week

When I was a much younger lad, I worked briefly as a grocery clerk. As you might imagine, it was a job that led to a lot of packed groceries. In fact, after a few months on the job, I got so good at it that I had a hard time letting other people pack my groceries for me. To this day, I have friends and family that make me cringe every time I watch them put cleaning supplies in with fresh produce, or a pot roast in with a bag of chips. Bag It!, the upcoming iOS debut from Hidden Variable Studios, is a puzzle game that celebrates my particularly unique skill set.

Players in Bag It! will need to take a particular grocery order and fit it all into a single paper bag – without squishing anything.

As you’ve probably guessed, there’s a certain element of physics at play here. If you place a heavy item (or several less heavy items) on top of the eggs, they’ll break. Or if you do the same with the bag of cereal, it’ll be crushed. In essence, Bag It! is a game about spatial recognition and weight analysis. Sure you can fit everything into the bag – but can you do it without damaging its contents?

The developers are promising more than 50 puzzles, adorable anthropomorphic food items, and unique reactions for each piece of edible goodness. We’ve recently had a chance to go hands on with Bag It!, and can easily say that it delivers on all of those promises and more. It’s a game that will feel right at home to players of other space-saving puzzle games like Tetris, and yet remains utterly unique. The only game I can even think to compare it to is the oft-overlooked Trash Panic on the PlayStation Network, but in that game the ultimate goal was to get stuff to smash rather than the other way around.

Bag It! Bag It!

If you’ve ever had to pack your own groceries (and let’s face it – how many grocery store actually lend a hand these days?), you’re going to feel right at home with the puzzling Bag It! has to offer. Be sure to check back with Gamezebo when the game launches later this week on November 17th for our full review.

Jim Squires is the Editor-in-Chief of Gamezebo. Everything you see passes his eyes first, so we like to think of him as "the gatekeeper of cool stuff." He likes good games, great writing, and just can't say no to a hamburger. Also, he is not a bear.