TouchTone
| TouchTone | |
|---|---|
App icon
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| Developer(s) | Mikengreg |
| Publisher(s) | Mikengreg |
| Designer(s) | Mike Boxleiter |
| Artist(s) | Greg Wohlwend |
| Writer(s) | Mike Boxleiter |
| Platform(s) | iOS |
| Release |
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| Genre(s) | Puzzle |
| Mode(s) | Single-player |
| Aggregate score | |
|---|---|
| Aggregator | Score |
| Metacritic | 84/100 |
| Review scores | |
| Publication | Score |
| 148 Apps |   |
| Gamezebo | |
| Pocket Gamer | 8/10 |
| TouchArcade | |
TouchTone is a 2015 puzzle video game for iOS devices by Mikengreg, a two-person indie game development team made up of Mike Boxleiter and Greg Wohlwend. The player monitors phone calls as part of a government surveillance program to find public threats. The player unlocks chains of emails by completing a series of puzzles wherein a beam is reflected around a room to a set destination. TouchTone's core concept grew from a two-day game jam immediately following their 2012 release of Gasketball, but only found its hacker theme following the mid-2013 Edward Snowden global surveillance disclosures. The tone of TouchTone's story grew from satirical to serious over the course of the game's development.
The game was released on March 19, 2015. Review aggregator Metacritic characterized TouchTone's reviews as generally favorable. Critics praised the game's visual style and story, but criticized the way the game did not allow players to skip puzzles. Reviewers found the light-bending puzzle premise unoriginal, but appreciated its thematic connection.
As part of a government surveillance program, the player monitors phone calls to find public threats. Apart from infrequent interaction with their handler, the player is left to solve puzzles in pursuit of one such lead. The puzzles are based on the "reflection puzzle" popularized by role-playing video games wherein the player moves mirrors to reflect a beam of light about a room. In TouchTone, the player swipes the screen to move pieces that redirect incoming beams, symbolic of phone signals, into specific locations. The waveform beams are displayed in different solid colors and must be matched with the destination "node" of the same color by passing through moveable pieces that reflect and split the beam. The pieces do not move individually but as rows and columns in cardinal directions.
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