'Short, sweet and to the point' would be the best choice of words to describe the Machinarium demo, now freely available through Steam and a number of gaming-related websites. Even though it spans just three short 'acts', it does more than enough to let you have a taste of what to expect once the game releases.

Sharp hand drawn visuals and a voiceless 'thought-bubble' way of storytelling give Machinarium a distinct image that sets it apart from the rest. Its twist on point-and-click gameplay is more than refreshing. Coming across usable items, for example, is only possible if the item is within the character's reach. This effectively removes the need for 'pixel hunting' or, at the very least, reduces the size of your hunting grounds. The character's ability to elongate is a nice gameplay element that introduces a new dimension to puzzle solving, which is done in a single 'act' to prevent backtracking. Another welcome change in the adventure game genre is the fact that you have to play through mini-games in order to open the game's puzzle walkthrough. This feature seems to make even cheating a challenging task, no matter how hard blasting spiders with a key might be.

Obviously, Machinarium has something special going on, and the demo samples the bond and balance between art and gaming well. Once you finish it, you can only go one of two ways: you'll either pre-order Machinarium because you find it exceedingly intriguing, or you'll feel that it's just not your cup of tea. All in all, an awesome taste test, but not for everyone.

Machinarium is available for pre-order with a 10% discount via the Machinarium website or, alternatively, Steam. If you pre-order your digital copy through the game's site you'll also get a 'Machinarium Preorder Pack', which comes with five high resolution screenshots and five tracks from the Machinarium soundtrack -- something that will definitely help pass the days till the game's release on October 16th.