Unbound: Worlds Apart (2021)

Picked this up on a Steam sale. Enjoyed it more when starting from the beginning but am not loving some of the very precise platforming. I am playing on Steam Deck and running into a LOT of hitches at just the wrong time which makes me die a lot. I don’t know I can fault the developers for this since the game came out prior to the Deck’s launch… though the game is verified.

The game has a great gimmick but that is about all it has going for it. The story is very trite and been done many times before. None of the characters are very interesting. Still I have enjoyed my time with it.

Title. The best part of the game is it’s puzzle designs and mechanics - you are able to channel an alternate reality with different effects depending on the area your are in; I.e. reverse gravity, shrink, alter environment. This was incorporated really well and definitely gave some great puzzles.

This is technically a metroidvania, but there’s is zero combat, and everything is a one-hit kill. The load times after death are instant, so it’s not a huge deal. But sometimes this minimalism of only having a couple buttons you can press detracted rather than added.

The worst part is the story, which is kinda the most generic uninspired writing that really numbed me. Also, the quest structure is just rinse repeat for every level (go get the 3 things to open this door!). Art style is also pretty bland and unoriginal.

Overall I had a decent time, but it’s not a game I’ll ever think about again or recommend to anyone.

The highly popular little kid in an oppressive environment trope has given Alien Pixel Studios the perfect excuse to create another platformer where said kid suffers extreme ordeals in order to save, this time around, the titular worlds. The kid is basically Red Riding Hood, with a candle twist.

He also happens to be a gifted mage who can open portals to other worlds, this being the game's distinctive mechanic. He wasn't always in an oppressive environment. In the beginning, we find him in a nice village that is in the middle of a celebratory event. Then some demon invades and the village will never be cheerful again. Demon invasions tend to do that.

All our hero has to do in order to save the worlds is to jump around, sometimes with help of his portals. He can only do a few extra things (double jump, wall jump, double dash), but there are many types of portals to help him along the way. He encounters a lot of NPCs and a decent variety of enemies (including cool bosses). Most of his journey is not particularly hard, but there are difficulty spikes here and there, and the last world he visits is very challenging.

The worlds themselves are beautifully hand drawn and the excellent soundtrack adds to their particular feel.

It was never going to be anyone's favorite game, but Unbound: Worlds Apart is a charming, fun and somewhat challenging platformer.

Have been very intrigued by this. But after playing the demo there didn’t seem to be as much going on as I had hoped. Granted it was early in the game but it looks like you will only ever have a single portal to manipulate. I was hoping more for something like Hue wherein the game layers in multiple powers you have to mix and match to solve the puzzle.

I will probably wait for it to go on sale again.