Crash Bandicoot 4: It's About Time Review

 (Originally published to Glitchwave on 2/6/2026)

[Image from glitchwave.com]

Crash Bandicoot 4: It's About Time

Developer: Toys for Bob

Publisher: Activision

Genre(s): 3D Platformer

Platforms: PS4, Xbox One, Switch, PS5, Xbox Series X, PC

Release Date: October 2, 2020

Crash Bandicoot 4: It’s About Time. As in, it’s about fucking time that we were treated to some bona fide Crash Bandicoot cooking as opposed to the slop the gaming industry has been serving us for decades now. Well, at least that’s how I personally interpreted the faintly hinted message behind the game’s title, considering how Toys for Bob ignited the Crash Bandicoot renaissance when their high-definition repackaging of the orange marsupial’s glory days sparked positive reactions from gamers instead of the normal revulsion that he’d been accustomed to after Naughty Dog knocked its baby bird out of the nest to fend for itself at the turn of the 21st century. One aspect of the title that leaves less up to interpretation is the number “four,” carrying the implications that this is Crash’s subsequent canonical outing after the N-Sane trilogy introduced us all to the hopping, shirtless wonder in 2017. How amusing it is that Toys for Bob are subtly retconning Crash’s sordid post-PS1 history and trying to repress it so deeply into our collective subconsciousnesses that not even the exceptional memories of a sub-Saharan elephant herd or Pepperidge Farms could recall its existence. However, I, and likely several other gamers of a certain age, cannot have Crash’s directionless, washed-up period erased from our recollections because those titles were fundamental in forming our young gaming prime that we now hold a nostalgic fondness towards. Besides, I still genuinely enjoy the boisterous comedic overtones of Crash Twinsanity, a title that is certainly a mark of Crash’s long-running span of career instability. Given that the only example of original Crash-oriented output that Toys for Bob conjured up was a single level tacked onto their repainted version of Crash 3, the notion that they had the skill and talent to baptize the bandicoot to total rebirth was a tad presumptuous on their part. However, after experiencing what Crash content they crafted in the broader expanse of an entirely original game in Crash 4, feigning amnesia to the fact of Crash ever having an Akuma-like rival in Crunch, using Cortex as a sentient sledgehammer, or partaking in piggyback rides with a bestiary of beefy monsters is something I’m willing to entertain.

Beyond my interpretations, Crash 4’s full title is actually a play-on-words that alludes to the game’s overall narrative conceit. Since time is still literally of the essence, as it was in the previous title that Toys for Bob put their mitts all over, veteran Crash players can make an educated guess as to which returning Crash villain is pulling the strings of this plot premise. The cerulean conductor of the clock, N. Trophy, has been trapped in the same timeless void that Crash condemned Cortex and Uka Uka to at the completionist (and now canonical) ending of Warped. Finally, after apparently a decade of struggling to escape, Uka Uka ruptures the rocks that kept them imprisoned to unveil one of N. Trophy’s time vortices. Immediately as the gang of familiar Crash villains exits their idle existences, Aku Aku’s clairvoyance for universal imbalance starts tingling and nags Crash to get off his lazy, narrow ass and act on his sudden intimation of dread. Well, I suppose that reworking all of Crash’s classic adventures has given the developers a clear idea of how to craft a typical conflict premise for the series. Am I implying that this run-of-the-mill introduction fails to break the mold of the franchise’s narrative constructs? Yes, but I realize that a Crash Bandicoot game isn’t going to feature the gravitas of a grave scenario akin to the epic scale of starting a world war. An inkling of evil-doing somewhere in the distance from Crash’s disembodied spiritual advisor is still a splendid way of starting the game.

Not that I’m intentionally piling on more criticisms onto Crash 4 to make a point of its unoriginality or anything, but I must comment on how the whole liberally traversing throughout the space-time continuum as a thematic motif is stripped directly from the previous (or at least in this conveniently contrived canon they're establishing) title. I could be wrong, but I don’t think Crash and Coco were ever intended to be the interactive answer to Mr. Peabody and Sherman (you’ll never guess who is who). Fortunately, ripping through the fabric of time and space with impunity makes for an incredibly strong thematic construct because of the variegated iconography that comes with the smattering of period-specific settings. In my book, Crash 4 can also be granted clemency for blatantly recycling an overarching theme because the game improves upon it with one essential ingredient: organization. Something that slightly irked me when Warped first tested the time travel concept is that the individual levels within the six warp chambers rarely ever maintained the general theme that was alluded to by the architectural design of each warp chamber’s background. Establishing a concise theme with a chamber backdrop just to feature levels that blatantly deviated from it within the same selection of six levels and then randomly encountering a level in a subsequent chamber that would’ve sensibly fit the previous one was a confusing, asinine habit that Warped continually kept committing. I think the developers here recognized that thematic continuity hasn’t exactly been enforced since the very first Crash Bandicoot game, which is probably why Crash 4 has adopted its more rigid, sequential world map menu in lieu of the chamber hub with more open parameters we had become accustomed to since Crash 2. Crash 4 may not showcase the same seamless journey from Crash’s wild jungle domicile to the precarious, mechanical cliffs of Cortex Castle, but at least every level that resides in each world sticks to the cohesive theme we can clearly discern from the world map.

Crash 4 walks down memory lane once again with two tutorial levels on Crash and Coco’s tribal home residency of N. Sanity Island, and the following world where N. Gin has inflicted his crude, mechanical sensibilities onto an arid canyon setting in a relatively distant future does not digress from its stark desert punk aesthetic at any given point. “Salty Wharf” maintains its pirate-centric atmosphere with its fragile rusty plank platforms and cutlass-carrying sea creature enemies, “Tranquility Falls” is heavily Asian-oriented throughout with lilypads littering its zen gardens and roaming dragons as airborne obstacles, and “The Eggipus Dimension” takes the recurring prehistoric level theme from Warped and elongates its presence to the span of an entire world without any interruptions. One could argue that the vibrant, jazzy city streets of “Off Beat” explicitly contrast with the desolate bayou at the forefront of the other levels in the present-day realm of “Mosquito Marsh,” but those people would be ignorant of the all-encompassing culture associated with the southern US state of Louisiana that the developers are tributing in all of its humid, voodoo-infused, Mardi-Gras glory. There are four other worlds featured in Crash 4 that also keep its thematic consistency just as resolutely as the ones I’ve mentioned, but my limiting of their descriptiveness for the sake of brevity is also indicative of another underwhelming aspect of the Crash franchise that this “fourth” title has promptly improved upon. Given that I was accustomed to the rules of sixes that Crash 2 and Warped were evidently exhibiting, I thought that ending the game with another tour through the Cretaceous Period was rather anticlimactic. To my surprise, Crash 4 augmented the typical bandicoot experience with FOUR whole worlds succeeding the usual six, all of which were equally as thematically consistent as the worlds that preceded them. Adding the longer lengths of each level into the equation that we also haven’t seen since the orange marsupial’s debut, Crash 4 is a splendor of riches more sumptuous than any title we still revere from his PS1 youth.

But what is the most decadent thing a 3D platformer can provide to spoil its audience? For my money, it's the ability to play as multiple colorful characters, an effective selling point that stimulated my gaming sensibilities as a child ever since Battle for Bikini Bottom allowed me to swap between SpongeBob and two of his undersea chums. The Crash Bandicoot franchise has indeed incorporated player interactivity for characters outside of the titular bandicoot in his mainline platformer adventures, but up until this very entry, Crash Twinsanity was the only game that afforded the player the luxury of this feature outside of pretending that Coco isn’t just a clone of her brother with more clothes and a blonde ponytail (another exemplary aspect of Twinsanity that should be considered in favor of not extinguishing it in this Crash Bandicoot revisionist campaign). Similar to the dynamic that defined Twinsanity, Crash’s comical creator and principal archnemesis of Neo Cortex once again begrudgingly collaborates with Crash. Eventually in the narrative, N. Tropy severs his working relationship with Cortex to instead enact his sinister plan of erasing billions of years off the universe’s archives with a female version of himself that he’s disturbingly infatuated with. After telling N. Tropy to go fuck himself (and he hilariously obliges), Cortex will transform enemies into platforms of three different variations of matter and execute a speedy dash maneuver to compensate for his lack of vertical aerodynamicism the bandicoots possess. I’m just relieved that he no longer controls as if Crash lodged a wumpa fruit up his rectal cavity, as he unnaturally did in Twinsanity. The more surprising Crash Bandicoot villain to newly cross over into a prestigious playable character status is the series’ resident chimera Dingodile. Living a tranquil, retired life in the remote Louisiana bayou after a career of petrifying penguins, Dingodile springs into action after Cortex and N. Tropy’s time shenanigans have inadvertently demolished Dingodile’s retirement venture of diner entrepreneurship. Hopping into a time rift to give his former cohorts a piece of his mind, Dingodile then becomes so hopelessly lost in the infinite stretches of space and time that all he wishes to do is make like Dorothy and find his way home. In the meantime, Dingodile will travel throughout a plethora of distinct periods using his trusty vacuum cannon to suction TNT barrels and crates and launch them as explosive projectiles onto enemies and hefty obstacles in what is definitely the slowest-paced gameplay variation that Crash 4 offers.

Dingodile’s newfound elevation of importance as a playable character might seem random to even the most devout Crash Bandicoot fans, considering his precedence amongst the various series bosses was not any higher than, say, for example, Tiny Tiger or Pinstripe Potoroo. However, the appearance of the last playable character in Crash 4’s roster that I’ve yet to mention should drop the jaws of every series veteran right to the floorboards. That is, if you fail to consider an outlying context behind the reemergence of Crash’s old squeeze Tawna. Debating whether or not sexual objectification or failing to pass the Bechdel Test because Coco is the sole female voice as the more severe social faux pas for the franchise to commit is ultimately irrelevant, for Toys for Bob have managed to hatch a plan to kill both of those unsavory birds with one stone. Arguably the most dominant plot device in science fiction today is the multiverse trope, and the limitless possibilities that come with such a concept have conjured up an “alt Tawna,” a fierce, independent, combat-capable chick who wouldn’t be caught dead being a damsel in distress. She’s also completely unrecognizable from a design standpoint, trading in her flirty tight T-shirt and jorts combo for tattered jeans and a spike-studded vest jacket to signify this Tawna’s defiant, “punk-rock” attitude. She looks as if she hails from a universe where the male gaze is no longer an oppressive, domineering force for women to tackle…because they’ve all gouged the men’s eyes right out of their skulls. If punk rock was what inspired Tawna’s new style and demeanor, it seems like bands such as Team Dresch and Huggy Bear were the ones responsible for this transformation, if you catch my drift. I don’t know; is it a coincidence that Alt Tawna aggressively strikes Crash on the noggin for simply expressing a natural curiosity about her radically different design when they first meet her and then doesn’t speak to any of the characters in a friendly manner except for Coco for the remaining duration she’s on screen? Look, man, all I’m doing is giving you the relevant pieces of evidence so you can form your own conclusions. Still, regardless if Toys for Bob is actually blowing this sociopolitical dog whistle in my face, I can excuse the peculiar design choices of this resurrected Crash relic because her spin kick and unique grappling hook gadget makes her the most aerodynamic character in the roster. In fact, the gameplay diversity that each of these secondary guest characters fosters is exactly why each of them is such a refreshing inclusion integrated into the mix of Crash/Coco’s typical dance routine of hopping, spinning, and the occasional aerial ground pound.

Don’t think just because Crash and Coco are the older dogs in this heterogeneous arrangement of playable characters that the developers assumed they couldn’t learn any new tricks. In addition to the player acclimating themselves to the particular quirks of their allies, the player must also contend with a slew of unfamiliar platforming properties that are mostly only applicable to the two gender-swapped skins of the main protagonist. Ironically enough, every single foreground asset debuting in Crash 4 is evocative of the earliest practices of the franchise, similar to the linear world map menu and the appearance of “Tawna” (technically). What is this practice, you may ask? Well, considering how Crash and his sister both often swing from ropes like a certain tie-wearing ape on jungle vines and abrade the rubbery soles of their sneakers while grinding on a series of mechanical rails like Sega’s blue bundle of joy (who might also be in dire need of this rewound rejuvenation treatment), the developers are dipping back into the influence pool of the same older platformer icons that conceptually sculpted Sony’s original mascot candidate. Wall running is also another staple platformer attribute that Crash 4 decides to implement, but I can’t quite determine which IP within the genre originated or popularized it to the point of an obvious association. Mirror’s Edge, maybe? I’m also not entirely certain which game could’ve convinced the developers to deem it necessary for Crash/Coco to roll through a cracked concrete road away from N. Gin’s tanky, fiery Mad Max mobile in a life-sized hamster ball because such a contraption has never been utilized throughout the genre’s storied history. Yeah…that’s the ticket.

My peculiar sense of deja vu also certainly didn’t begin to tingle when I was introduced to Crash 4’s other major gameplay component in the Elemental Quantum Masks. If Aku Aku’s presence in every Crash game is any indication, the festive, ritualistic face obscurers have always been a key ingredient to the Crash franchise’s identity. Outside of Aku-Aku still providing Crash/Coco his protection once he’s freed from a wooden encasement, a quartet of the sage’s sacred brethren have been implemented in Crash 4 to extend their services to the primary playable protagonists (and only them). Also, similar to the series steadfast sagely presence, each mask that is introduced once per every other world pronounces a prominent personality trait that correlates with the innate ability they possess. The first mask we become acquainted with is the electrically blue ball of nerves Lani-Loli, whose flaring neuroses might cause the indecisiveness of which platforms on the field are corporeal and which ones will cause Crash/Coco to fall into oblivion with their physical transparency. The strikingly purple Akano is a brooding beast of a mask that speaks very few words, incorporating the bluntness of his nature to heighten Crash/Coco’s spin maneuver into a raging tornado that elevates them upward into the skies. Kupuna-Wa is essentially everyone’s childless aunt who adopted a bohemian attitude that fit her lenient lifestyle, which anyone who could manipulate time to slow at their command probably would. Finally, the theatrical disposition of Ika-Ika between comedy and tragedy exemplifies the contrasting realm between gravity and anti-gravity. If you’ve been paying attention, you’d notice that all of these magical masks accomplish is augmenting the already-overflowing gamut of platformer abilities to an exorbitant extent. Still, I welcome this foursome of abilities they foster into the flooded foray of moves because they all complement the diversification of the platforming at play without meandering into disruptive, gimmicky territory that the unmentionable games of series past have been guilty of injecting into the Crash formula.

The instances of using any of the Quantum Masks are arguably also the most challenging bouts of platforming on display. For the duration of time playing through the world where they are initially encountered, the subsequent levels implement the mask ubiquitously enough that the player will receive a hearty amount of practice with their unique mechanics. Once all of the Quantum Masks have been accounted for and the game assumes the player has honed their elements down to science, every level across the frou-frou, Futurama foody world and Crash 4’s high-definition reimagining of Cortex Castle at the game’s final stretches incorporates all of them as an ensemble. In some cases, like in the last primary stage of Cortex Castle, the shuffling between every mask is an instantaneous process, demanding the player react acutely to the hazard at hand in the blink of an eye. After finally conquering this strenuous challenge, I swore that I heard each mask utter “RUDABAGA” upon rewinding failure after failure more than I heard Aku-Aku speak this unintelligible catchphrase throughout the entire series. Of course, the overwhelming moments with the Quantum Masks are emblematic of a greater topic regarding Crash 4’s steep difficulty curve. Like with the world map and Crash’s estranged former belle, Crash 4 again finds it pertinent to revert to the oldest of Crash Bandicoot outings and rekindle the most rigorous test of the player’s tenacity that was unparalleled until this entry unearthed this unforgiving difficulty demon from its tomb to inflict suffering on 21st-century gamers. However, unlike the first Crash game that expected the player to withstand outstandingly unreasonable odds, Crash 4 at least grants the player a myriad of accommodations to stave off any fatal “game overs” that are likely to occur. Chiefly, the player is given the option of an infinite death toll as opposed to the traditional life counter that triggers a “game over” if it reaches zero. I decided to stick with protocol not to uphold my questionable gamer credibility, but because I had assumed that the more attuned sensitivities of modern gaming would’ve placed it at least on par with Warped in terms of difficulty. The fact that I was accumulating lives by the barrelful as if I was playing DKC: Tropical Freeze affirmed my preconceived notions, until I desperately needed every life I stocked after N. Tropy was out of the picture. Strangely enough, before the climactic portion when my life counter started to nose-dive, it impressively dwindled during a number of the world-finishing boss segments. Matching the rhythm of weaponized sonic waves erupting out of N. Gin’s concert sound system was difficult to detect, and I fell between the speeding asteroid platforms in N. Tropy’s twin battle too many times than I'm willing to admit. Another reason why it’s disappointing that he couldn’t have retained his cardinal villain status throughout the narrative!

Admittedly, my life counter did tend to drop a few units whenever I attempted to satisfy a level’s completionist conditions, which is a whole other Pandora’s Box the player can open if they’re feeling masochistic. As per Crash Bandicoot customs, the player must meticulously scrounge up every box found in the level and break them like Ivan Drago, which will warrant the rewarding of a crystal gem. Apparently, every time period across Crash 4 is afflicted by an inflated gem economy because the game will give away two gems for reaching a certain percentage of broken boxes as a consolation prize, along with a couple of others if their death counter doesn’t exceed three or five and if they manage to spot a gem hidden outside the peripheral boundaries of the immediate pathway. I’d decry this adjustment to Crash’s completionist system as pathetic appeasement, only if there weren’t several other stifling conditions factored into mastering Crash 4 that have never been considered before. Once N. Brio is defeated, an “N. Verted” version will be attached to every previously finished level and every level beaten onward. The stylized, MacBook photo filters applied to every level are more grating than anything, but the player should realize that their integration implies that they’ll be obligated to complete the game to its entirety AGAIN under the same completionist stipulations. The segregated “test subject” sections, elongated bonus stages framed as Cortex recording Crash as his box-breaking guinea pig in his laboratory before the bandicoot defied him, are exacting enough as is. Add on the stern caveat of keeping Crash’s death counter empty to retain the tape’s availability on the field, and retrieving the tapes is an excruciating escapade in and of itself. Did I mention that untainted perfection is an entirely separate condition factored into cleaning the completionist slate? Oh, and we can’t forget the notorious time relics, where the lack of the running shoes that were granted to Crash/Coco in the N. Sane trilogy might require them to take up juicing another substance beyond the sweet nectar of the wumpa fruits to satisfy the platinum conditions. SOUNDS LIKE A HOOT, DOESN’T IT. Players might be accustomed to pulling out a few hairs in frustration during any previous Crash Bandicoot completionist endeavors, but Crash 4 will turn them bald as Mr. Magoo and probably as blind as the geriatric cartoon character due to an anger-induced rupturing of the blood vessels in one’s corneas. Scientists say that stress is the silent killer, and life is too precious to have one’s cortisol threshold tested to the extremes while trying to tangle with the sadistically comprehensive checklist that Crash 4 insists upon. A health warning should be printed on every physical copy of Crash 4 like a carton of cigarettes.

Typically, tackling the completionist route across any title in the franchise is the only way of satiating the dismayed feeling I get after playing the skimpy, surface-level conditions of reaching the end of a Crash Bandicoot title. In the case of Crash 4, I’m happy to report that for the first time, my hunger pangs have been quelled because this return to form for the hyperactive, tanned rat is a feast most bountiful. Its levels are richly lengthy, exquisitely designed, marvelously multifaceted with its various mechanics, and the worlds that encircle them are capped off with bosses that don’t bullshit around like their previous incarnations. Just by performing the bare minimum of foiling Cortex’s plan to eradicate Crash, I actually felt as if I ate a full course meal. Eating anything beyond that in the 100% route would’ve given me the gaming equivalent of “the itis.” We get it, Toys for Bob, you’ve achieved your Eagle Scout standing in crafting Crash Bandicoot levels. Still, that doesn’t give you the right to become a desert eagle scout and snipe every player with completionist overkill. As hostile as they seem to be to us gamer visitors, it’s beautiful that the Crash franchise has finally settled in a loving household after being passed around by a bunch of abusive foster parents for so long. In this enriching environment, the series has healthily produced what is undoubtedly its greatest entry to date, nostalgia be damned. Welcome home, Crash Bandicoot!

The Last Guardian Review

 (Originally published to Glitchwave on 1/28/2026)

[Image from glitchwave.com]

The Last Guardian

Developer: Japan Studio/Team Ico

Publisher: SCE

Genre(s): Action-Adventure

Platforms: PS4

Release Date: December 6, 2018

I can still recall a time when I was super-duper jazzed about the release of The Last Guardian. Once I unearthed my PS2 copy of Shadow of the Colossus from the musty depths of my extensive back catalog, I was absolutely enraptured by its inventiveness regarding its boss battle methodology, its monastic approach to exhibiting its gameplay without diminishing the epic presentational scope surrounding it, and its unorthodox narrative conclusion that involuntarily dropped my mouth open wide enough that a shoebill could’ve flown in it. The lasting result of playing Team Ico’s magnum opus was setting a lofty standard for the games that I would play moving forward, ones that I deemed worthy enough to exemplify gaming’s strengths as an artistic medium that often shared the same stripped-down similarities as Team Ico’s output (ie., Limbo/Inside, Silent Hill to some extent). In a way, this practice was almost an act of rebelling against the bloated, microtransaction-mired modern gaming landscape. I would’ve been content with the older hardware I already owned if not for the fact that Team Ico had emerged from their decade-long hiatus to craft another one of their artistically-inclined titles that was exclusive to Sony’s then-current system, so I then proceeded to shell out enough money to purchase it. Ironically enough, it was the console’s other exclusives such as Bloodborne and Persona 5 that would catapult me out of this mindset that SotC engendered, for I was treated to modern games that provided the substance of an artistic gaming experience without having to espouse Team Ico’s idiosyncratic, “addition by subtraction” ethos. This is probably why when I finished all of these glitzy distractions and finally attempted to play The Last Guardian almost three years into owning a PS4, I found myself surprisingly repelled by it, unable to stomach more than twenty minutes of it, like when my college roommate tasked me with finishing off a bucket of this bourbon slushie concoction that he made a week before to free up space in our freezer. Seven years and with almost 350 game reviews in my wake, it became increasingly apparent to me that my inability to finish The Last Guardian was not due to being spoiled in the moment by newer games that placed themselves into my personal canon alongside its Team Ico, PS2 predecessor. People often express that The Last Guardian is a “mixed bag,” and I can wholeheartedly attest to this sentiment.

Incidentally, even though it’s arguably the forefather of the “video games as art” credo that I devoutly practiced for a brief period of my life, Ico was not a game that I incorporated into this personal repertoire. Only now, after playing it to review it three years ago, do I notice some stark similarities between its plot premise and The Last Guardian’s. Speak up if this sounds vaguely familiar: a young boy finds himself in a sticky scenario situated in an alien environment where he can at least determine is far from the comfort of his home. Instead of a dark dungeon inside of a towering fortress, the boy’s entry position is a damp cavern where the only source of light is produced by a crack in its ceiling. Also, instead of sharing the space with a ghostly white, demure girl trapped in a cage, the boy is alarmingly close to a wild beast that acts homicidally hostile towards him when it awakens from its own comatose stupor. However, like the mouse who generously plucked the thorn from the lion’s foot in Aesop’s classic fable, the beast begins to trust the boy when he extracts the painful spears lodged in its body. Instead of using the sharp, stabbing weapons to pierce the beast in a more vital area of its anatomy like SotC, this interaction sparks a mutual trust between the boy and the beast where they must collaborate to help the boy find his way home. Obviously, there are a few relevant components to this plot premise that distinguish it from Ico. Still, anyone can contest that the foundational core of this premise and the overall mission that happens subsequently rings eerily similar to Team Ico’s first interactive outing. I believe the unappetizing aspect of this was due to the colossal standard that SotC had set in its artistic sensibilities. Sure, it shared Ico’s atmosphere and a deliberate dialing-down of gaming’s cluttered excessiveness, but both games were completely dissimilar in their respective approach to action-adventure games. Repurposing the general gameplay concept of an already established Team Ico property sort of disillusions me, knocking me down into the reality that they aren’t truly visionaries and they can't execute the idea well like any other developer. Am I being unreasonable, or was SotC THAT extraordinarily transformative?

This isn’t to say that SotC was the peak of gaming perfection, especially in its presentation. Specifically, I think that even the biggest SotC enthusiasts, myself included, concede that the lethargic framerate was definitely not one of its more flattering aspects–even though I defended it on the stance that it elevated the grandiose scope of every colossus encounter. Ico may have also been plagued by this presentational snag given that it existed on the same hardware, but it was far more noticeable when playing SotC. However, two gaming generations onward, well into the era of glossy, high-definition, The Last Guardian had no excuse not to buck this unfortunate trend. Alas, chugging along through every bit of movement is apparently a recessive gene that The Last Guardian has inherited from its PS2 ancestors. Is this seriously an intentional aspect of this game’s presentation, a requisite ingredient of regression to stick it to mainstream conventions? Tis’ a shame that they’re so stubborn, for the breathtaking beauty that is sluggishly being rendered at a sub-30 FPS is equally as evocative of its predecessors as well. The derelict ruins of a deceased, motionless society still retain their ability to marvel and awe after Team Ico’s third time using this particular iconography for another of its title’s settings. This time, however, the developers saw how the unending graphical progress of the medium pruned both Ico and SotC several years onward and accounted for this inevitability by dabbing a cel-shaded tint over the visuals. Trust me, it doesn’t look as cartoonish as The Wind Waker infamously did; the air of dejection and uncertainty is equally as palpable here as Team Ico’s other IPs, despite the comparatively radiant glow gleaming off of various set pieces in between the corroded crust of an ancient civilization.

Or, perhaps the subtle graphical luminosity that The Last Guardian displays was incorporated to make the environmental elements found across the game more prominently discernible from a gameplay standpoint. The more substantial connection between The Last Guardian and Ico beyond its similar premises is its emphasis on platforming in its predominantly action-adventure genre designation. Under chief director Ueda’s decree of dogmatic minimalism, progression in Ico was intended to subvert that of a Zelda dungeon. Whereas Nintendo’s iconic fantasy series typically features both elements of platforming and puzzles that tend to be delegated to individual rooms of its dungeons as stark progression impediments, the constant platforming performed all across Ico was a puzzle in and of itself; a fusion of Zelda’s key gameplay components coalescing so as not to fracture the seamless environment with manufactured, video gamey sequences. Automatically, The Last Guardian’s recycling of Ico’s foundation diminishes the subversive nature of such an ingenious blending of gameplay elements, for its repeated utilization cements it as its own established foundation for others to appropriate, just like the common tropes borrowed heavily from the older innovators of the medium. However, what The Last Guardian contributes to the ascetic formula founded by its predecessor is broadening the scale and scope of its immediate gameplay environment. While nothing in Ico’s environment was apparent as a trinket of traversal, the isometric angle from the player’s perspective sort of honed in on which ledges, ladders, or other protuberant environmental pieces were readily available in the moment. The immediate surroundings in The Last Guardian, on the other hand, never minimize the astonishing breadth of its world for the player’s convenience. Even when the player isn’t situated in an expansive outdoor environment, the enclosed areas they’ll find themselves in from time to time remain as spacious as the ceiling of a cathedral. With such a vast perimeter of area to explore on their expedition, who knows how long it’ll take before the player finds the intended path that leads The Boy closer to his destination? Once you find yourself exasperated after checking every conceivable crevice to no avail, you’ll learn that the trophy that requires you to finish the game in under thirty hours isn’t as lenient a condition as it initially seems.

The player’s overall time taken in leading The Boy away from this desolate pit is also heavily protracted by the collaborative element of The Last Guardian’s gameplay. Even though more comparisons to Ico can be reasonably made due to the playable protagonist sharing the majority of screen time with an NPC, I’d be hard-pressed to refer to the dynamic featured in Team Ico’s namesake game as a “collaboration.” If anything, Yorda was a glorified key that Ico had to painstakingly accommodate to ensure she’d be present when faced with a sealed gate that could only open with her magic, a textbook example of an escort quest with the developer’s veneer of artistry draped over it. Luckily, the different sizes and species of The Boy and Trico, a non-descript title for the playable protagonist and the canon creature name of the ten-ton-sized beast accompanying him, respectively, naturally foster a symbiosis between them as mutually beneficial as an oxpecker cleaning the mouth of a hippopotamus. The Boy here is easily Team Ico’s most delicate protagonist to date, feeling the gravity of every leap onto a ledge or a precariously situated platform and having to momentarily either readjust himself or recuperate as anyone realistically would outside the realm of a video game. It also never occurs to him that he should fashion a sizable stick or one of the spears he plucked out of Trico’s torso into a tool for self-defense, leaving himself helpless to any active adversity he might face on his perilous journey home. While I’d personally prefer to feel at least moderately equipped to deal with any threats found on the field, The Boy’s vulnerability is admittedly accounted for by the whopping, animalistic aggression of his colossal companion–hence the “guardian” portion of the game’s title. Trico is also quite the advantageous tool for traversal, crawling on his backside and carrying The Boy up steep vertical ledges using his limited flight capabilities. Trico’s tail can also conduct a surge of red lightning if The Boy shines a circular beacon of light reflecting off of a shield he finds to clear debris or demolish any wooden obstacle. Conversely, The Boy’s miniature stature allows him to navigate through the more cramped corners of the world to activate switches and to dispose of the stained-glass eye mirrors that Trico harbors an inexplicable, paralyzing aversion towards. The Boy also seems to be the only one capable of finding food to fuel Trico, even though I’m certain that all the wood he’s ingesting in those barrels is harming his digestive system in the long run. Needless to say, it’s evident that neither of them would cover much ground in this isolated setting without utilizing their set of skills that come with their polar physicalities.

Complications, however, often arise with Trico’s portion of the platforming duties because the beast’s brain is approximately the size of a Werther’s Original. Granted, commanding Yorda to aid Ico during the few sections where more than just her magic was needed to progress wasn’t exactly smooth and uneventful. Still, I’m giving the poor girl a pardon because she’s as diligent as a worker bee compared to Trico. Because the line between escorter and escortee in The Last Guardian is blurred between the playable protagonist and the NPC, the reliance on Trico to engage in both puzzles as well as platforming is far more prevalent. What this connotes is that the player must ride Trico’s ass (both figuratively and literally) in regards to commanding specific actions for him to perform. Otherwise, when left to his own devices, Trico will either absentmindedly wander around or lie down as if he’s ready to catch forty winks. Hell, he tends to do this even when The Boy attempts to guide him towards their nearest goal that only Trico can feasibly reach. Sure, there is a small selection of specific commands that The Boy can vocalize, but since when do the characters of Team Ico’s games speak English? It’s like training a dog that only responds to commands in a language you don’t speak by converting him to follow another language that you ALSO can’t understand. I’ve been told that Trico’s overall aloofness was intentional to emulate the behaviors of a flesh-and-blood animal in the real world. While I admire this level of immersion on paper, in execution, having Trico constantly hinder the player for the sake of realism is counterintuitive to the acute reactivity of puzzle solving. Other times, Trico’s detached attitude matched with the game’s widened platforming parameters made some sections extremely oblique. Pray for the divine intervention of RNGsus whenever water is a relevant environmental factor, for it takes a miracle to both figure out how to navigate around the drink and then communicate to Trico how to sufficiently enact the solution. The times when I was red-faced, screaming at Trico for his borderline insubordination were too numerous to count, and I found myself despairing hard enough to leave this game unattended for yet another seven years or more.

Despite how many times I exclaimed to Trico that I was going to make the world’s biggest pillowcase or a pelt fit for a football field out of whichever bodily material I could salvage after slaughtering him in my state of absolute infuriation, I could not bring myself to carry out these violent threats. Trico is just too goddamn adorable for me to keep my psychotic promises. For all of the ill-conceived ideas that went towards his mechanics, Team Ico belted a home run in regards to his design. As far as his phenotypical characteristics are concerned, Trico is a biological mishmash of a mythical, winged griffin and a fusion of the most popular mammalian household pets–the whiskers and mannerisms of a cat with the playful affection of a dog, respectively. I’m surprised that Hagrid isn’t leading the crusade to tear the boy and beast asunder, for the famous cryptid connoisseur would absolutely die to have Trico near the hills of the Hogwarts campus where he lives to study his majesty. Still, for as beguiling as Trico inherently is, his mammoth size reminds me of when my parents used to remind me as a kid that if my childhood cat was bigger than me, she’d eat me. Disregarding the fact that Trico does indeed devour The Boy on occasion whenever he’s hypnotized by a machine that emits sonic waves, the possibility of Trico reverting to his initial hostility towards the boy and animalistically eviscerating him drives a fearful wedge in their blossoming relationship. Eventually, once the tension dissolves after their continual collaboration, the bond created between the two is a beautiful sight to behold. I can’t even begin to describe how I melted when Trico jumped for joy after bringing The Boy back to a state of living after an unfortunate incident rendered him unconscious. In fact, I even began to treat Trico’s withdrawn nature with more compassion as the game progressed as well, calmly referring to him as “buddy” instead of “furry/feathery fucking imbecile” whenever his presence was required. The beast that was once a ball and chain wrapped tightly around my ankle that I begrudgingly partnered with as a means to an end soon transformed into genuine affection that I’d express towards a real-world furry friend. Trico had become the Rain Man to my Tom Cruise, and I would hurry home to catch Judge Wapner on TV for him if my life depended on it.

Unfortunately, there are forces of oppression that reside in these hallowed grounds that seek to disrupt the harmony of this unlikely pairing, and it is not Hagrid, as I jokingly stated beforehand. A combative group in The Last Guardian are the animated suits of armor that will seize The Boy and carry him into the blindingly bright, white light that probably leads to somewhere he likely won’t escape too easily. Or, at least that’s what I assume happens because even without Trico reducing these creeps into scrap metal to save my hide, I could effortlessly slip away from their grasp. Just mash every button on the controller as if you’re an actor pretending to play video games for a scene, and the mass of squiggly, cuneiform etchings meant to signify The Boy’s struggle will dissipate and allow him to scurry away momentarily. Because their attempts to capture the boy are laughably pathetic, this army doesn’t exactly provide an imposing, antagonistic blockade to The Boy’s quest. However, we can still harbor a potent resentment towards them because of the implications behind their intentions. We learn in a lengthy, mid-game cutscene that Trico is a breed of beast trained by the suits of armor to abduct children from a village located in the vicinity and transport them to the game’s secluded setting, which Trico would’ve done had he not collapsed due to being struck by lightning mid-delivery. Something about the sequestered surroundings of their practices, the occult ritualism, and the eager way they approach the boy like a sexually starved catholic priest suggests to me that if the boy broke free and blew the lid off their operation, certain names would be redacted to protect some seriously powerful people. Even if I’m completely off base with my analysis because my mind is hopelessly stuck in the gutter like a pesky acorn, you have to admit that painting these jerkoffs in this despicable light from what context clues are available does elicit some impassioned rage against them as opposed to simply being annoyed by their chronic appearances.

Whereas the blue pedophiles knights in shitty armor fail to cause the player’s heartbeat to race, the same cannot be said about encountering one of Trico’s flying brethren. One in particular roams the territory to trounce Trico for his supposed treachery, and dealing with this brute as it savagely plunges its claws and razor-sharp beak into your furry friend is the closest The Last Guardian comes to both a boss battle and a genuine form of the “panic puzzles” that were littered throughout Ico. Although Trico did not meet his untimely demise as a result of this scuffle, as the scene suggests, this tragedy tease did remind me of the sinking intimation I had, judging by the game’s tone and Team Ico’s other story resolutions, that The Last Guardian was not ending on a happy note due to the death of either of the main characters. Considering that The Boy is omnisciently narrating the events with a deeper voice that implies he’s long surpassed puberty, I would’ve bet money on Mr. Fluffy pushing up daisies before the credits rolled. When our heroes climb the ominously pristine palace where the armors reside at the game’s climax and a whole tribe of Tricos bushwhack our furry friend, I knew it was time to collect my winnings. Not with glee, naturally, as witnessing one of them pull on Trico’s tail hard enough to sever the tip caused me to cringe and recoil in discomfort more than any grizzly execution cutscene seen in Manhunt. Alas, I would’ve lost my wager either way because, to my utter shock, neither character passes on over the rainbow bridge. After The Boy manages to pull the plug on the operation by destroying the central sphere and freeing the Tricos from its control (an esoteric orb is responsible for the rampant abductions and child molestation? What in the Scientology is this shit?), our Trico concentrates enough of his remaining strength to finally spread his wings to their fullest potential and bring the boy back to his village. Because neither character has the strength to communicate to the rightfully outraged villagers that Trico comes in peace this time, The Boy softly speaks the “flight” command to Trico so he can take off unscathed into the sunset. Years later in a post-credits epilogue scene, we now see that The Boy is now “The Man,” uncovering the old shining shield he once used alongside his furry friend, which then diverts to the cavern where we see the mood ring eyes of Trico light up to signify that he made it back safely that day. Believe me, I was as relieved to see Trico alive and well, like Sully reuniting with Boo at the closing scene of Monsters, Inc. Still, the sadness I had anticipated somehow struck me with a surprise from the source of its resonance. All this time, I had expected the pain of losing a pet, but the star-crossed status of their relationship, resulting in both growing older separately, conjured up the disconnection one faces between them and an old friend. The sentimentality it evokes still stings like a bitch.

I don’t think I have the constitution to finish writing this review. My brain and my heart are currently waging war with one another on how to assess The Last Guardian, and I think this bedlam in my body is going to result in a stalemate. On one hand, it behooves my brain to criticize the game for its piss-poor mechanical performance regarding the framerate and placing an NPC intended to mimic the inferior intellect of an animal at the forefront of some abysmally obtuse platforming puzzles. My heart, on the other hand, is refuting that Trico’s uncanny mirroring of an animal is exactly why the game is so impactful, and I’ll admit that a game has never strung the cords of my heart strings over polygonal caricatures quite like this before. I’m facing a losing battle as to whether to applaud The Last Guardian as an effective work of art, or lambaste it as interactive drudgery. Therefore, I’m going to sit smack dab on the fence like a coward and situate The Last Guardian in the sweet center between a masterpiece and an abject disaster. Fuck, man, play the game yourself and form your own opinions. I can’t do this today.

Cave Story Review

 (Originally published to Glitchwave on 1/21/2026)

[Image from glitchwave.com]

Cave Story

Developer: Studio Pixel (Daisuke Amaya)

Publisher: Studio Pixel (Daisuke Amaya)

Genre(s): 2D Platformer

Platforms: PC

Release Date: December 20, 2004

Hey kids, do you like indie games? You know, video games that are created and produced independently outside of the circle of triple-A industry influence? I sure as hell do; their ingenuity, rough-hewn quirks, and humble productions have always reinvigorated my passion for the medium when it seems like the big business realm of gaming keeps whittling my soul down to a stub with their contemptuous and condescending practices. It’s extremely fortunate that in a time when triple-A developers grow progressively more nonchalant about slapdashing their expensive products day by day, the indie circuit rivals their more opulent countrymen in sheer abundance. If you’re like me and perceive the influx of retrograded or artistically stylized graphics and Metroidvania (or Metroidvania adjacent) design formats that have defined the indiesphere for well over a decade now to be a veritable buffet you never want to stop indulging in, I believe there is one single source of this trend that we can send our tokens of gratitude towards: Cave Story.

For any aspiring indie developer who believes that they’ll take the indiesphere by storm with their coming-of-age, horror-tinged gay awakening story starring a cast of anthropomorphic furries, I hope you realize that your brainchild will never have as much indie cred as Cave Story. Millions of gamers might have purchased Halo 2 or GTA San Andreas while Cave Story sold a meager ten thousand back in 2004, but those who bought the more modest latter were inspired to create their own games as a result (a topical spin on the Brian Eno quote comparing the impact of Sgt. Pepper versus the first Velvet Underground record). Actually, the words “bought” and “sold” are misnomers on my part. Daisuke Amaya, the solo developer behind Cave Story, spent five years financially debilitating himself to ensure he’d have enough of a breather period per day to finish this passion project in a relatively timely manner. After half a decade of likely subsisting off of dollar-store cardboard ramen and whatever bugs managed to crawl into his shoddy apartment, the man was kind enough to publish his painstakingly crafted creation to the internet to download for a whopping sum of zero dollars and zero cents. There’s a point where someone’s selflessness steps beyond admiring their altruism to becoming concerned with their psychological status, and Daisuke Amaya evidently needs some serious counseling. Still, perhaps Mr. Amaya factored in a long-con approach to receiving compensation for his self-inflicted labor, for its availability allowed Cave Story to increase the span of its ring to impressionable gamers without the inherent perk of being able to amplify it to the mainstream masses. Years later, Cave Story is cited as a major influence on Braid, Undertale, Iconoclasts, and other titles that would cement themselves as gaming staples during the indie golden age that is still currently ongoing. I can state with confidence that Cave Story is bar none the most influential indie title in the medium of gaming, but is its everlasting ability to spark inspiration sustainable two decades onward? Given that Cave Story was created in a time with sparser technology on a budget of what we can surmise wasn’t even enough to engage a coin-operated laundry machine, is it time for the indie muse mantle to be passed onto another worthy title that isn’t beset by the complications of the rudimentary conditions that could have possibly been factored into developing a video game? While Cave Story does exhibit some elements that would be deemed as rather unsightly or undercooked by the comparison of its competent and more privileged indie acolytes, I defy anyone to contest the charismatic heart and soul that lies within its crude exterior.

Notice how I made the distinction between the pure Metroidvanias and games that simply incorporate some elements of the genre into their level designs in the previous paragraph? I’m not entirely sure there’s a definitive term that labels games with levels that exist between the fast, timer-duressed platforming of Mario and Sonic and the exploration-intensive, meticulously-paced Metroidvania subgenre, but Cave Story certainly treads that line. Don’t be deceived into thinking it comfortably fits the latter by the fact that health and weapon upgrades are scattered across the levels. Sure, the game offers plenty of incentive to explore, but everything that can be obtained on the field does not lead to plunging further into any portions locked by utility-gated hindrances. The encompassing level design that Cave Story seems to exhibit is a horizontal span with defined parameters between the entry point on the left side and the eventual dead end situated on the right. It’s platformer level design 101 that would be utterly orthodox if not for the lack of a clock ticking away that discourages the player from curiously hopping around the elevated vertical ground that surrounds them. However, just because the other end of the level is a logical destination doesn’t mean that a flag pole will greet the player and tally up the player’s time score once they leap on any point of its vertical stretch. Within those elevated cliffs potentially lies the next progress point for the player, or at least the subsequent point of progression if their immediate destination did happen to be the opposite side of the area, or behind a door that leads to a small room or arena where dialogue or a boss battle commences. Naturally, the objective of finding where on the map furthers progress subtly incentivizes the player to explore an area to its entirety outside of the interest of augmenting one’s maximum health. While creating a compact sandbox to roam around is infinitely more engaging than a straightaway trek from point A to B, I wish that the objective surrounding the exploration process maintained some sense of clarity. When an NPC assigns a quest to the player, like a scavenger hunt to find the ingredients for a bomb or retrieving an elderly woman’s five dogs that have run away, the objective components to progression are made crystal clear. Other times, however, dialogue that might be spoken by the NPCs the player encounters may not spell out their following course of action. I don’t need a glowing breadcrumb trail or a blinking series of arrows to explicitly direct me towards my goal like I’m an impatient child, but finding myself frazzled due to revisiting the same rooms and failing to trigger any semblance of progression occurred too many times for comfort. Walking from one side of a lake to the other in Mimiga Village to obtain an item clashes with traditional Metroidvania logic but alas, the player is sincerely intended to test the threshold of the protagonist’s lung capacity to its absolute limitations. I’m thoroughly impressed by the layers of depth that exist in each of Cave Story’s areas, but a fully fleshed-out Metroidvania map achieves the same level of richness while pronouncing how to progress through it less obtusely.

Another reason why Cave Story might seem a little more linear than the indie Metroidvanias it would undoubtedly influence is that traversing from one side of the area to the other evokes something akin to staving off one’s demise in a traditional 2D platformer. As par for the the 2D platformer course, the source of adversity between destinations is the scourge of enemy activity ready to annihilate the player with their overwhelming swarms of offensive forces. Admittedly, this is also a component of difficulty in a Metroidvania game, and Cave Story features several states to relieve the player of their choking vulnerability in generous increments, similar to that of a less straightforward realm of platformers. Still, I think the game recognizes that the level of adversity that exists between progression points can get quite staggering all the same, which is why Mr. Amaya has equipped his anemic, Pokémon Trainer-looking protagonist with an arsenal liable to arouse any NRA member. Scouring the dim tutorial cavern, the Protagonist will uncover a standard pistol from a treasure chest to procure any fundamental source of defense against the hive of bats that the player was forced to evade only moments ago. A rocket launcher is the only explosive weapon with enough firepower to obliterate the gigantic, oxygenated jellyfish that globs onto the ceilings of the “Grasslands.” The flamethrower’s rolling properties seem to do wonders with targeting the sentient dinosaur skulls that pace across the specific inclined platforms of the “Sand Zone,” while flinging a sword at the cockroaches that populate the upper deck of the same area seems to be more effective at exterminating them than anything the Orkin Man could ever whip out of his van. As potent as the projectile piece of steel craftsmanship proves to be, I’d still recommend trading it for the “Nemesis,” Cave Story’s juggernaut weapon equivalent to Ratchet & Clank’s RYNO. I wish the option to trade “The Bubbline” was available, or at least any avenue to dispose of this wimpy squirter of suspended soap. Still, perhaps the addition of a dud weapon is just a byproduct of a diverse weapon roster, where the weakest item unfortunately gets shafted when all of its peers prove to be far more useful in the long run. While not all of Cave Story’s weapons are created equal, the various situations at least implore the player to use everything at their disposal at least once. Plus, the weaker weapons all have the advantage of infinite ammunition, making a case to keep them around once even the rocket launcher requires multiple shells to blow enemies to smithereens.

Besides the specific scenarios where every weapon showcases its strengths, the player should ideally be intrigued to use every weapon for at least a little while because each of them will be enhanced via gaining more experience with them. However, Cave Story does not subscribe to the typical EXP system where the simple, continual usage of one weapon will increase its attributes. In fact, Cave Story’s EXP system for its weapons still remains so unique to its source that you’d swear that Mr. Amaya legally patented it. Instead of increasing the bar inside of the level meter automatically upon defeating an enemy, they will expel mango-colored triangular shards of varying sizes depending on the enemy’s size and tenacity. Only by collecting the shards that become strewn across the ground like candy being tossed from a parade float will any of Cave Story’s weapons evolve, and said evolution involves a plethora of noticeable perks. Ammunition from weapons like the machine gun becomes prominently larger; a single firing of the rocket launcher will unleash three shells simultaneously for the price of one; the flamethrower spurts will become so scorchingly hot that its color will turn a ghoulish white, etc. The ammunition that spews out of the machine gun at its maximum level is even powerful enough to propel the player upward if they aim down while airborne, a nifty traversal technique to supplement the jet boost before the gadget becomes available.

As awe-inducing as each weapon will be at its maximum level, the caveat behind this system is that its apex can decrease if the player sustains any amount of damage while it's equipped. As they say, the lord giveth, the lord taketh awayeth, and I don’t mind the harsh punitive measures at play because any scratch of regression can be easily remedied while motivating the player to stay alert of all enemy activity around them. That is, until I’m faced with one of Cave Story’s bosses where choosing the appropriate weapon can either make or break the player's victory. Factoring in which weapon to use when chronically batting away Balrog is fortunately irrelevant. He’s a stubby toaster and miniature refrigerator hybrid with no attack range to speak of, and the enclosed arenas he bombastically barges into like the Kool-Aid Man are nicely ironed out and simple. However, with the heightened, projectile firepower of bosses such as Weapon X and the Dragon Sisters, whose fights are engaged on more complicated terrain where the player can only damage them with slivers of opportunity, the likelihood of weakening the only sensible weapon increases tenfold. Forgive me if I’m not MLG pro enough to toss a flamethrower spurt down the gullets of the Dragon Sisters like I’m playing a round of cornhole. Only in these instances do I wish that Cave Story just crafted a normal weapon experience system that remained intact upon reaching its limit. Judging by how absolutely none of its disciples chose to adopt this eccentric mechanic, it’s safe to say that it was an experiment that didn’t entirely pan out.

If Cave Story isn’t afraid to raise the stakes of combat to the point of debilitating the player, wait until we delve into the narrative context surrounding the action. Titling this game as “Cave Story” does not ring to me as a mere coincidence. Above all of the other elements that the developer put his blood, sweat, and tears into, the story aspect was definitely the one that he bled, sweated, and wept over the most, given its outstandingly intricate lore, characters, and conflict premise. It turns out that Cave Story’s playable protagonist isn’t suffering from a severe vitamin D deficiency, but that his blanched skin can be attributed to the fact that his body is composed of a metallic mold meant to resemble a human. He learns in his amnesiac stupor that he is one of the few surviving robot scouts sent to a floating island suspended above Earth’s atmosphere that were programmed to target the land’s native mimiga population. Even though the rabbit creatures seem absolutely helpless despite their evident hyperintelligence, their secret weapon they employed to trounce their gun-toting invaders is consuming a red flower that transforms them into brutish, Hulk-like beasts, where the amplified effects are irrevocable. Years later, scientists revisit the isolated grounds of this failed imperialistic endeavor to research the “demon flower” phenomenon when one of them, referred to as “The Doctor,” stumbles upon an artifact called the “demon crown,” whose arcane properties corrupt the intellectual man into a bloodthirsty tyrant. Now, he’s hellbent on cramming as many of the red flowers down the throats of the mimiga to create an army of roided-out supersoldiers to become Earth’s despotic ruler with the aid of his witch advisor Misery and the aforementioned Balrog as the muscle of his operation. The Doctor’s intentions are the main source of conflict that are made abundantly clear by the NPCs immediately when the Protagonist (who is canonically named “Quote”) returns to the scene of his defeat in Mimiga Village. The cliché good versus evil conflict premise could’ve sufficed, but the contextual tidbits behind Quote’s existence and initial purpose, the latent, abominable natures of the perceivably cuddly and defenseless mimiga, and the esoteric evil at the root of The Doctor’s change in disposition unveil a multilayered, comprehensive world as rich and detailed as the fall of Rome.

Between learning of the storied history behind the peculiar island and its nation of bunny people while spelunking through its cavernous machinations, Cave Story’s thick layers kept peeling back more and more thematic substance that wasn’t overtly exposited by the characters. Considering that our boy Quote’s circuitry is wired to make rabbit stew of the mimigas and instead sides with them to conquer their oppressors, there seems to be a prevalent theme of defying one’s true nature or commanding officer and sprouting an autonomous consciousness. Surprisingly, the extent of this thematic undertone is explored with Balrog of all characters, who gradually steps towards the side of aiding Quote and the mimigas and opposes his “master,” The Doctor, every time Quote wipes the floor with him as he insists on making an appearance. Does Balrog’s dynamic arc make him the true protagonist of Cave Story, or is he still a useful idiot who we can at least be grateful for when he starts lending his doggedness to the good guys? More overtly on the side of revolting against the powers of strong-arming are how some of the mimiga express an impassioned fervor against those who seek to subjugate them. Combating this persecution against the mimigas the most actively is King, the de facto leader of the remaining mimigas in their home village, whose bloodshot eyes and scar-studded visage signify that this bunny is a badass who shan’t be toyed with by bullies. King would rather die than see any of his kind get abducted and turned into monsters, and unfortunately, that bargaining statement becomes a reality when he’s fatally struck down by a cracking bolt of lightning summoned by Misery during battle. Using King’s death as a segue, what I believe to be the strongest element of Cave Story’s narrative is raising the stakes of the heavy scenario by killing off characters. The game isn’t the least bit afraid of making their adorable little cast of castigated critters squeal in agony, whether it be annihilating them outright or euthanizing them for the greater good after their Dr. Hyde mutations blossom from eating the red flowers. Having to subdue the sweet and innocent Toroko after The Doctor force-feeds her the flower is an especially heart-wrenching turn of events. Scenes of various mimigas meeting grave fates are upsetting in the moment, but as they marinate in my mind longer, the tragedies do wonders for instilling the severity of the conflict at hand.

Then there’s the untimely demise of Curly Brace, a female humanoid built for the same purpose as Quote but is also going against the grain and aligning herself with the mimigas she once sought to slaughter. Given her unique kinship to Quote and the fact that she’s an aidful member of the opposite sex with a vivacious personality, this blonde bot screams manic pixie dream girl so loudly that I can hear both The Smiths playing from one side of her headphone speakers and The Shins from the other. Nipping this cliched relationship in the bud before I start to facepalm, Curly Brace is out of commission when she sacrifices herself by giving Quote her bubble-breathing apparatus when a battle arena completely floods to the point of inhabitability. Programming a waterproof robot with a drowning function in the first place is unspeakably cruel and unusual, but I digress. As much as I’d like to commend Cave Story for stocking even more grief to fuel the fire against The Doctor and his cronies, the game does offer an extensive avenue to resurrect Quote’s soon-to-be girlfriend in one of three potential endings. I implore the player to stop thinking with their dicks, or whatever sexual appendage serves like a penis that Quote may or may not possess, because I’d argue that the game punishes the player if they go the extra mile to achieve the ending where Quote and Curly live happily ever after (with Balrog third-wheeling it for the remainder of his days). Firstly, taking the steps to drain the immense volume of liquid from Curly’s core is quite the ordeal, where the specificity of a task’s completion can lead to accidentally neglecting it entirely. Secondly, when Quote arrives at the secret labyrinthine temple on this path, and the game greets him with the message, “Welcome to Hell,” do not take this message lightly. The route up to the game’s absolute final boss in the grand poobah Ballos is the first and only instance when Cave Story becomes a precision platformer, jetting around rows of deadly spiked walls with unpredictably asymmetrical patterns throughout. After that tense excursion is finished, Cave Story continues to make the player sweat buckets with FOUR rounds against Ballos, an excruciating endurance test that the player will be begging for sweet release by only the third phase. Considering the multiple transformations where Ballos becomes bigger and more malformed with every phase, the Sigma from Mega Man X comparisons write themselves. Unless the player sincerely wishes to secure some suggested robot sex for Quote as a reward for his outstanding heroism, I recommend sticking to the “neutral ending” where Quote conquers The Doctor and Misery and leaves the island with Sue and her human scientist brother, Kazuma, on the backs of the dragon he painstakingly attempted to hatch in the Egg Corridor all this time. Conversely, I will judge you harshly if you decide to expedite Quote’s egress with Kazuma at the soonest moment the dragon is hatched, saying “fuck this” to The Doctor’s sinister plans coming to fruition, to live in the far-off mountains without a care. And I thought bartering the sword weapon that has King’s lingering spirit imbibed in it for the Nemesis was the most damning example of selling your soul in Cave Story.

Daisuke Amaya, you beautiful bastard. I know your secret, buddy; you’re actually an alien that beamed yourself down to our planet to benevolently give us earthlings the gift of gaming with Cave Story. I simply find it hard to believe that any one of us would be able to create something of such an unprecedented magnitude that superseded all of the cheap, crude flash games that represented indie gaming at the time where financial gain wasn’t an applicable factor in crafting it. Alas, the reality isn’t that there wasn’t a jailbreak from Area 51 circa the early 2000s. A starving artist from Japan truly did accomplish the impossible with only his two hands and the cheapest computer software imaginable, making gamers like me moist with sprightly shooting gameplay, adequate level design, and a poignant story with, and I must impress on this, multiple fucking endings with several secret routes attached. Still, what we’re intended to take from Cave Story is not that Mr. Amaya is superhuman, but that any aspiring developer can make a game of this caliber if they persevere. Where some of the triple-A King Neptunes of the gaming industry are cynically serving up shite on a conveyor belt per year, there's the indie SpongeBobs taking their time to program hearts into their interactive vision’s binary code thanks to Cave Story setting the example. Pardon me, I’m getting verklempt just thinking about it.

Infernax Review

 (Originally published to Glitchwave on 1/19/2026)

[Image from glitchwave.com]

Infernax

Developer: Berzerk Studio

Publisher: The Arcade Crew

Genre(s): Metroidvania

Platforms: PC, Switch, PS4, PS5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X

Release Date: February 14, 2022

Usually, when a modern game pays homage to the pixelated period of the NES, it harkens back to the celebrated titles that molded the medium. Yet, we can’t allow this fun little nostalgia streak to color our perceptions of the past. The eraser we’ve been using to etch out the medium’s mistakes cannot be so effective that it completely clears any graphite smudge tracings that indicate a mistake was never made in the first place. Gaming must always preserve the memory of its errors not only for preventative measures, but also to preclude a false impression that gaming had reached its spotless peak ages ago and it's been on a steady decline since. In addition to pronouncing these blemishes with sensible prominence, I’m a vocal advocate for taking these failures back out of the scrap bin and tweaking them to a standard of adequacy, something the industry rarely ever attempts to do. Fortunately, risk-taking is a common aspect of the indie sphere, and Berzerk Studio showed the world how brass and behemothic their balls were when they created Infernax; a fused tribute to both Castlevania II: Simon’s Quest and Zelda II: The Adventure of Link with modernized flourishes. As you all might be aware, these NES sequels live in infamy as the designated “black sheep” of their long-running respective series. I’ve certainly done my fair share of shitting on Simon’s Quest, and while Zelda II holds an ultraspecific position in my heart, I don’t question the unanimous disdain it receives from fans of the series. Still, while I concede with the popular sentiment that both of these games are fundamentally flawed experiences, neither of them was a complete waste of cartridge space. Both titles implemented admirable feats of innovation in world design and action-adventure combat, but were ultimately suppressed by instances of austerity and irritatingly tepid tedium to extreme degrees on opposite ends of the spectrum. Using hardware that is light-years more advanced than Nintendo’s indestructible 8-bit box with over 35 years of criticisms to use as reference, Infernax takes a stand to rectify some of the most salient sequel sins in gaming history. Or, at least that’s what I believed its mission to be, but it became rather difficult to determine if we were on the same page.

I’m not certain whether it's the evolution of the medium’s sensibilities or the unshackling from Nintendo’s family-friendly brand, but Infernax revels in the potential for brutal violence fostered by a fantasy, medieval-esque thematic backdrop that an 8-bit Zelda and Castlevania couldn’t provide. Zelda should ideally limit the level of bloodshed to maintain its fairytale whimsy, but it always struck me as inappropriate to center a series around Dracula with not even one drop of the organic red fluid making an appearance. On the other hand, Infernax spurts and gushes red pixels like a confetti cannon, so vividly that the developers felt obliged to issue a disclaimer stating that its explicit content might terrify and/or warp the minds of impressionable children. Besides the expulsion of cherry-colored sprites leaking like a sieve out of every enemy, Infernax really cranks up the grotesque viscera with its animated, comic-like still shots. Alcedor, the crusader protagonist returning home from an exhaustingly lengthy crusade overseas, finds that there is something rotten in Denmark when a rather feral peasant crosses his path. If the player decides not to trust the ambiguity of the frantic scene, meeting the man with the head of his trusty mace will display a gruesome, stylized image of the commoner's face pulverized to a pulp–where the only discernible physical feature is his eyeball bursting out of its socket by the optic nerve. The screen becoming eclipsed in a jarringly red backdrop as the protagonist meets a terrible fate is a visual reference from Zelda II. Still, I don’t recall this death sequence ever depicting Link getting decimated to a bloody paste in comical, overkill fashion–with the silhouetted screen almost acting as a source of censorship. The game over screen that follows every death is a rather ghastly image of postmortem Alcedor with his entrails wrapped around the murder weapon still lodged inside his torso. Boss designs are creatively freaky and grotesque, and female NPCs tend to be more buxomer than those that invited Link in for some “healing” of the (alleged) Marvin Gaye variety. Considering how suppressed the extent of a game’s visuals can be when pixelated, it’s impressive how genuinely disgusting the overall presentational flair of Infernax is. I certainly never felt the instinct to wince at anything I’ve seen in any NES game, much less Simon’s Quest or Zelda II.

For those uncultured swine who took the line in the previous paragraph literally, no, Infernax’s setting is not the Scandinavian country that owns Greenland. The dark fantasy land of Infernax is the Duchy of Upel, where Alcedor has achieved the noble status of dukehood. Upel features an array of topographical assortments commonly associated with a regal dominion, such as flat, breezy valleys, precarious mountain peaks, musty caves, and a cemetery for good measure to signify the domain’s storied history and its high mortality rate. Several separated burgs are also scattered across Upel, where the player can converse with the NPC denizens for new quest information in addition to providing comfortable respite from the various hostilities that surround them. I suppose that integrating towns as hubs is a mark of world design that can be credited to both of Infernax’s primary NES influences, but the uncivilized lands outside these quaint settlements are modeled 100% after Simon’s Quest. Before you decide that this sentence is a dealbreaker, I’ll place myself in the rare position of defending the legacy of Simon’s Quest–begrudgingly, of course.

Simon’s Quest may not have been granted the distinction of the Castlevania game that prompted the Metroidvania portmanteau, but arguing that it at least laid out the skeletal fundamentals of the subgenre is anything but an outrageous claim. Simon’s Quest failed to ignite the revolution because its broader, non-linear approach to 2D platformer design proved to be more lethargic, disoriented, and disappointingly pathetic than watching an ancient, wheezing dog trying to drop a deuce. In all fairness, Metroid’s NES debut isn’t the one receiving royalty checks for its contributions in formulating the Metroidvania mold either, so I’ll use Super Metroid’s eminent influence on the subgenre as evidence that the NES was simply too primitive to cultivate that extra dimension of design depth. Because Infernax is merely masquerading as an unsophisticated NES game like a child of an upper-middle-class wealth bracket wearing clothes they purchased at a thrift store, it can achieve that nuanced design philosophy that was inconceivable on Nintendo’s first home console. Progression is no longer a cryptic, confusing ordeal, as each upgrade Alcedor receives on his journey should spell out exactly where it is utilized in advancing through Upel. Every night is still a horrible night to have a curse in Upel, as it was in Dracula’s district, and yes, there is a day-and-night cycle sequence that abruptly emerges on screen and stops all action dead in its tracks. However, the creatures that appear before dusk signal the day’s end aren’t as sluggish and submissive compared to the Scooby-Doo ghouls that roamed the grounds during daytime in Simon’s Quest, so the transition isn’t nearly as jarring. Oh, and any service provided in the towns will still be available after the sun has set–thank fucking Christ. Overall, there isn’t anything extraordinary about Infernax’s map or its methodology in progressing through it. Still, it’s awfully neat seeing something with Simon’s Quest’s particular graphics, setpieces, and geographical layout exhibit a substantial level of competence, like a clunky old toy being remodeled with new parts. Infernax isn’t a perfect overhaul, however, as there is a progression point involving summoning lightning that is equally as oblique as kneeling in a specific spot for a tornado to whisk the player away. If this is intended as an homage, shouldn’t the developers realize that you can’t pay tribute to something that everyone collectively dislikes?

We’ve detailed plenty of characteristics that Infernax shares with Simon’s Quest, so let’s now turn our attention towards what it shares with its other parent, Zelda II. Particularly, it’s consistently brutal and unforgiving difficulty curve that, believe it or not, arguably even exceeds that of its other primary inspiration. Similar to that of both Simon’s Quest and Zelda II, Infernax’s main quest trajectory is divided into five dungeon milestones that are located all across the map and are intended to be completed in a specific order. Once Alcedor has triumphed over the challenges within these five labyrinths, the pentagram-shaped seal locking the entrance to the final palace will be broken, and Alcedor can duel the source of the scourge that plagues his homeland. Unfortunately for the player, Alcedor’s path to victory is akin to a kilometer-long coal walk with shards of glass the size of tree bark strips. A single death in Infernax is all it takes for the player to witness the “game over” screen with Alcedor well into the rigor mortis process, and reviving our protagonist will revert the player’s progress back to the last save shrine they prayed at. Because the error margin for death in Infernax is incredibly strict and absolute, the player is constantly on pins and needles attempting to prevent a frustrating cyclical loop of lost progress. Field traversal tends to demonstrate a moderate level of adversity, or at least the enemy activity seems consistently manageable because checkpoint shrines are scattered across the map in reasonable placements.

The dungeons, however, are the epitome of an endurance test where every nick of damage received should be treated with stark gravitas. Because light doesn’t permeate through the dank catacombs of these arcane establishments, the player’s prayers to save their progress while encountering crushing contraptions, perilous platform placements, and dozens of dangerously savage enemies at a shrine will be unanswered. Admittedly, it’s fortunate that the player isn’t forced to hike back to their demise point from Alcedor’s arrival point like Link from the mausoleum in Zelda II because a shrine will at least be located directly outside of the dungeon. Plus, the strain of spelunking is significantly reduced when the player can afford upgrades and potions to stave off death’s harshly punitive hands. Before Alcedor can feasibly fund his increased likelihood of success, however, the first few dungeons will prove to be as maddeningly difficult as Zelda II’s notorious Death Mountain section that has been slaughtering hundreds of thousands of gamers' souls since 1987. The strategy that I employed was dividing each dungeon’s two primary destinations-the upgrade and the boss battle-and returning to the entrance so my arduous trek to procure the upgrade wouldn’t become all for naught. Still, approaching every dungeon in this manner does somewhat compromise the climactic arc generally felt while conquering this self-contained challenge area. If all else fails, the game suggests to players who are struggling to regress to a “casual mode,” where extra lives can be stocked aplenty, and shrines emerge in the dungeons that are probably powered by magic (or maybe there are undisclosed electrical outlets). Do not be deterred by the condescending attitude the game may express or be repelled by the thought of tarnishing your credibility as a gamer, for I would argue that “casual mode” is the ideal way to experience Infernax. Most Zelda II detractors commonly bemoan that the overly punishing difficulty stipulations are what stain its enjoyment factor, so injecting these quality-of-life enhancements into the fabric of an already frustrating game should quiet those prevalent vocal criticisms. Besides, it’s not as if the gameplay fundamentals decrease in difficulty on casual mode either. Infernax becomes breezier with every potion purchased and upgrade area allotted, but its final boss proves to be hilariously easy compared to the earlier challenges that precede it. What a horrible night to have a glaring oversight in your assbackwards difficulty curve.

Infernax’s final boss may not prove to be the pinnacle of the game’s challenges as it's propped up to be, but the finale should still be stimulating because of the smattering of different endings that could occur. Specifically, two endings designated as “good and evil,” plus lighter versions of both of them that fall on the less defined areas of the moral spectrum. In the absolute good ending, Alcedor succeeds in forever ridding Upel of the demon scourge and ushers in an eternal era of peace for the kingdom, while the more sinister side of Upel’s future sees Alcedor using the Necronomicon source as leverage to bring forth a “reign of unholy terror” as its tyrannical leader. The game also adds some incentive to delivering doom onto the world with Alcedor at the helm because evil Alcedor swaps his plain ol’ nice guy mace with a giant sword, whose radiant orange glow probably becomes brighter the more it pierces the blood of its victims. Ultimately, the player will probably end up with an inferior ending where Alcedor dies a hero after the final battle or where he becomes afflicted with the infectious demon plague because Infernax’s choice mechanic is rather vague about which decisions are meritorious or scandalous. For example, I assumed that I had nobly euthanized the villager at the game’s beginning because he was a zombified husk of his former self with no humanhood to speak of. However, the man’s wife chastising me for my choice that continues when she locks me out of her home in Arkos signaled to me that I made a grave mistake. That is, until I learned that sparing the man results in him transforming into a hideous, beastly boss that you have to kill anyway, which is probably a nightmare of a brick-wall battle if we recall the game’s reversed difficulty curve. I still feel rightly vindicated for my original decision. The same logic of showing compassion to those afflicted with the demonic curse did not apply when I chose to reason with a caged beast instead of torching it, for it took my act of diplomacy as an opportunity to slit the throat of a human bystander. I genuinely wasn’t feigning ignorance when a priest reprimanded me for “stealing” some coinage from a church, for it was sitting pretty on a pedestal as if it was a reward for my discovery of the institution. Forgive me, Father; I’ve been playing too much Zelda, and Link is apparently a bad influence. Maybe I’m just a gigantic clod, but Infernax’s choice mechanic seems to operate on a “damned if you do, damned if you don’t” scale. It seems inappropriate to treat the outcome of every decision they make with glibness when their choices have a direct effect on the narrative’s conclusion. Common sense is factored into a good handful of the choices, but be prepared to also make a massive faux pas and then defend yourself hysterically while the Curb Your Enthusiasm theme starts playing to accompany the scene.

So what was Berzerk Studio’s objective that drove the development of Infernax? Initially, I thought it was to enhance some of the NES era’s most notable blunders, but it almost seems to me that we’ve found a group of people who genuinely respect and adore both Zelda II and Simon’s Quest with no trace of irony to be found. They didn’t unite under the goal of making the average gamer reconsider the flawed, undercooked properties of either game, but to pay tribute to them exactly in the same way that Shovel Knight famously did for the bona fide NES classics. Well, I suppose it’s bold of them to express their love for two things that are commonly reviled. Still, what makes them think that unsavory elements of either title, such as the gruelingly punishing difficulty curve and hints of cryptic nonsense, would now be appreciated decades onward if they were just repeated? Blood and boobies shouldn’t be the prime selling points, but perhaps those hints of bawdy irreverence spell out a sort of parody Infernax might be conveying in its overall homage. You had one job, Infernax, and instead of doing that job, you fucked around and got sloppy.

The Legend of Zelda: Spirit Tracks Review

 (Originally published to Glitchwave on 12/15/2025)

[Image from igdb.com]

The Legend of Zelda: Spirit Tracks

Developer: Nintendo

Publisher: Nintendo

Genre(s): Action-Adventure

Platforms: DS

Release Date: December 7, 2009

After gulping down the icky-tasting Phantom Hourglass, you’ll forgive me if I wasn’t hopping at the chance for another taste of the DS Zelda experience with The Legend of Zelda: Spirit Tracks. I’m not saying that the double-screened mobile console’s whack at Zelda’s iconic action-adventure formula resulted in a disaster of epic proportions that dug a six-foot hole in the dirt for the franchise to lie in after suffering wounds deep enough to prove fatal. Still, Phantom Hourglass was agonizing enough to the point where I felt inclined to apologize to a certain Wii-exclusive Zelda title that I had been lambasting and referring to as the nadir of the Zelda franchise for years. What exactly made Phantom Hourglass so horrendous that it supplanted Skyward Sword from its whipping post? Let’s put it this way: while the eccentricities of Skyward Sword’s motion controls presented a difficult hurdle to overcome, like sitting in traffic on the way to work, I’d go as far as to say that the touchpad and microphone-oriented kineticism of Phantom Hourglass oppressed the game like it was living under a ruthless, fascist dictatorship. Implementing the piece de resistance of the DS’ hardware into every conceivable facet of Phantom Hourglass' gameplay proved to be incredibly overbearing, a showcasing of the console’s capabilities with impractical ambitions that remained unchecked at the game’s release, much to our collective chagrin. Given that Spirit Tracks exists on the same system that housed Phantom Hourglass and is functioning on the same engine, we can assume that it shares the same habit of relying on its central control gimmick to an irritatingly excessive extent. While this remains to be the case, I did not find myself struggling through Spirit Tracks sip by sip like the revolting double IPA that was Phantom Hourglass. In fact, the tolerant reservations I had initially approached Spirits Tracks with had soon evolved into a genuine sense of engagement.

One might attribute Spirit Tracks’ favorability to its DS predecessor on the surface-level basis that it has reverted to traditions. Even though this iteration of Link is of the expressive, cel-shaded “Toon” variety, he evidently isn’t confined to the strikingly blue sea that drowned the series’ standard setting as I had presumed he was. No, the bulbous blonde boy (or at least another incarnation of him) now exists in the glorious kingdom of Hyrule without any water damage to speak of, like his fellow green-garbed doppelgangers with sharper physical features. Princess Zelda would probably glare at Link with confusion and concern for his mental well-being if he ever suggested that she had an alternate ego who sailed valiantly with a crew of salty seadogs and spewed sass with the elegant proficiency of a master swordsman. The same sense of befuddlement would probably translate to Link’s sensei Alfonzo, who is a dead ringer for Tetra’s first mate Gonzo. Link and his mentor travel to Hyrule’s capital, where the princess resides, so her majesty can bestow on Link the honor of graduating from his school of engineering, but something wicked will defer the celebration. In the most obvious tell of foreshadowing I’ve seen, when he smiles sinisterly, Spirit Tracks pulls a Chrono Trigger by having Cole, the chancellor in Hyrule’s cabinet, conspire in a murder plot against the princess. The only difference is that Cole succeeds in his nefarious plan with the aid of his equally villainous cohort, Byrne, reducing her to a ghostly, phantom form after one effective Avada Kedavra magic blast. Once the treacherous duo has done away with Her Highness, while also erasing the kingdom’s transportational tracks and seizing control over the Tower of Spirits, the next objective is to use Zelda’s lifeless, vacant body as a vessel for a malevolent demon lord they worship named Malladus. If their intentions aren’t to have Malladus establish a reign of darkness and terror over Hyrule, I’d be shocked. With the dread of their insidious plan potentially coming to fruition hanging over their heads, both Link and Zelda must travel across Hyrule’s vast jurisdiction and retrieve each district's respected sacred Macguffins as par for the Zelda course, which will restore the balance to the kingdom that was just brusquely upset. You read that right, Link AND Zelda will be teaming up on an adventure together for the very first time in over twenty years of the series existing (at the time). She doesn’t exactly provide the same humorous chemistry as Linebeck, but it’s about damn time that the titular series character received a more substantial role in the spotlight of a Zelda title. All it took was pulverizing the poor girl to an immaterial state of being in what is arguably the grimmest Zelda premise to date.

I feel as if I was a bit cagey in detailing certain bits of context behind the premise of Spirit Tracks because they reveal the grander scope of the game’s core gameplay concept that is certainly pervasive enough to warrant its own paragraph. What branch of engineering has our dear Link now reached a graduate level of proficiency in? Railway engineering, as becoming the conductor of a train, is quite a lucrative vocation in an incarnation of Hyrule where this steam-powered mode of transportation serves as the primary method of traversal. You can then imagine how removing the series of tracks would put the kingdom in a state of dysfunction and why it was a fraction of Cole and Byrne’s plans to disrupt order and stability. It goes without saying, but train travel or anything remotely resembling industrialized technology is a first for the series. It even caused contentious outcries from fans who expressed that the concept inappropriately smacked of modernity in a series that should ideally stick to its traditional realm of medieval fantasy. Personally, I fully embrace the idea. My very first fandom, for lack of a better term, between the infancy ages of 2-5 was Thomas the Tank Engine, a British children’s franchise mostly associated with its disturbingly expressive characters juxtaposed with the static movement of their models. Because I spent a great span of my childhood reading the books and watching the TV series, I recognize the quaint charm and whimsy of Thomas the Tank Engine, as the series intends to evoke the warm, wistful sensation of a world through the ubiquity of train travel that was lost in the industrial/digital ages. Wasn’t The Legend of Zelda initially conceptualized as a whimsical retreat back to a less sophisticated period of Miyamoto’s life? Trains certainly weren’t fathomable in the Middle Ages, provided that Zelda is indeed a product of the period’s fantasy tapestry. Still, trains are now antiquated enough to conjure up a yearning for simpler times that no longer exist as society has progressed, a mutual thematic undercurrent between the two aforementioned series. Hence, trains are a wonderful way to give Spirit Tracks some distinctiveness.

Surprisingly, train travel also solves the issue of restrained exploration that was prevalent in Phantom Hourglass. Sailing on the Great Sea in Wind Waker always proved to be a constrained affair, with Link being forced to cooperate with the directional blowing of the seabreeze lest his trajectory come to a sluggish crawl like pumping blood through a clogged artery. Wind was no longer a relevant condition to work around in Phantom Hourglass, but I’d rather pause for a few seconds to change the arrow’s placement than commit to a drawn line that moves Link from the line’s origin point to its destination with no room for deviation. Such rigidity really drove me up a wall throughout the entirety of playing Phantom Hourglass, making even the tiniest of trips grueling on what is possibly the smallest Zelda world map to date. Though the train that Link conducts is restricted even further by design, this does not inherently mean that the traveling process becomes even more suffocating. Link’s train comes with four different acceleration settings: the standard rate of speed and its quickened increase, a brake that slows it to a stop after a few seconds depending on the previous pace, and a reverse function that rolls backwards only at the train’s neutral speed. The player can control the train’s trajectory by tracing the destination route on the tracks like Phantom Hourglass, but the train will still chug along automatically provided the player has its controls set to any sort of acceleration. The player can even change their course by flipping the various track switches found in every fork in the road, even when the train’s trajectory has been laid out by the stylus. If the developers insist on limiting the player’s autonomy in traveling throughout the overworld, at least they’ve now crafted a transportational system around this snag that is sensible and strangely streamlined. As for the combat portion to keep the player entertained during their trips, Link’s train is fashioned with a cannon that shoots an unlimited supply of cannonballs whenever the player pokes the screen with the stylus. Just be careful to sound the whistle by pulling the train horn on the screen whenever an animal is on the tracks instead of an enemy, or else they’ll meet your accidental misdeed by ramming the train like a raging bull. Why is it that farm animals are the most tenacious creatures in the Zelda universe? Also, it’s important to note that the “dark trains” that roam around on the tracks are invulnerable to shelling, so it’s best to evade these mechanical monsters whenever you see them belching pitch-black smoke from their funnels in the distance. They present an opportunity for the player to flex their competency with the train controls, but it is rather annoying having to navigate around them to prevent a fatal collision.

As for the legitimate enemies that can actually be extinguished, their encounters ultimately depend on which district of Hyrule Link is choo-chooing away in at that given moment. Hyrule as depicted in Spirit Tracks really emphasizes the kingdom’s diverse range of ecological themes. Link will start shooting Skulltulas that swing pendulously above the tracks in the shaded groves of the neutral, grassy “Forest Realm.” After that, he’ll travel north, where sentient, hostile snowmen will attempt to pelt his prized train with their own rounded, anatomical pieces that regrow instantly because of the frigid climate that surrounds them. Enemies that resemble flying miniature elephants will dive bomb onto Link in the polar volcanic realm where the Gorons reside, and the aquatic, oceanside realm, where the cumulative sand is bisected to a small desert realm, borrows the floating squids from Phantom Hourglass for the player to beat rupees out of like a piñata. The “Ocean Realm” is also a highlight here because the tense precariousness of holding this hundred-ton train on narrow tracks over deep waters turns into a pure marvelous spectacle when the tracks are submerged underwater, and the train cuts through the drink like a dream. While the eclectic environments are a striking source of Hyrule’s diversity, one could lament that the expanse of this world is subdued by the lack of exploration facilitation caused by the linearity of the train tracks. I feel as if the developers recognized this likely feeling of disillusionment and implemented some unique collectibles to prolong their time in the overworld. Whenever Link docks his train at the assorted destinations alongside the main course, the player should be vigilant about the locations of a “stamp station.” Here, Link can chronicle the various locales around Hyrule for his elderly neighbor in Aboda Village so he can experience the fulfillment of adventure via a second-hand avenue. It’s quite sad, really. While traveling on the tracks, the player should keep the sight of rabbits in their peripheral, for an enthusiast would like to add as many bunnies to his sanctuary in the “Forest Realm” and compensate Link favorably for his troubles. The rabbits also tend to be slippery suckers during the net minigame that engages once Link blasts away the platform situated under it, so be prepared to take note of where their encounters occurred. I was always hesitant to pursue any extracurricular activities available in Phantom Hourglass, but I allotted much of the time between the obligatory sections to wrangle up rabbits and fill that empty journal with each area’s unique artwork for Niko’s pleasure.

Of course, the player can only revel in these interesting subsidiary tasks if they work towards Link’s primary goal of restoring the tracks that lead to each of these locales. I’m sorry if I trigger sensations of shellshock in players who were traumatized by The Temple of the Ocean King, but Spirit Tracks also implements a winding, multi-floored ancient construction that the player chronically revisits after completing a dungeon milestone in the Tower of Spirits. Before you write out a will thinking that a double dosage of a mega dungeon will kill you, know that this colossus is a gentler beast than its older brother. The tall exterior foyer where Link parks his train features a series of entrances that are unlocked with each progression milestone met, meaning that the player can actually continue from the highest floor they’ve unlocked as opposed to digging (or climbing in this case) from the surface and painstakingly retreading one’s steps ad nauseum. In addition, there also isn’t a timer breathing down the player's neck while they jump from floor to floor, mitigating the unnecessary tension and allowing the player to experience meatier puzzles that require more contemplation. Besides fixing everything about The Temple of the Ocean King that made me exclaim “what were they thinking?!” in a rhetorical fashion, Tower of Spirits also provides one of the game’s most distinctive mechanics. Everywhere else in Hyrule, Zelda is but a floating dialogue channeler for our silent protagonist, more in the vein of a windbag buddy like Daxter and less like the notorious series nagger Navi, who attempts to mandate the course of progress at every waking moment. In this lofty monolith, however, she genuinely collaborates with our hero. Spirit Tracks seems to subscribe to the mythical ghost phenomena that claims they can possess living bodies if they so choose, simply absorbing their earthly forms by flying into them. Once Link collects enough of the iridescent tears scattered about the dungeon’s floors, a full set will grant him the power to penetrate the armor of the phantom guards with his sword and allow the incorporeal princess to possess them. Once she’s in a solid, living substrate, Zelda will transmute the physical capabilities of guards for Link’s benefit. Depending on which guard Zelda is commandeering, she can either illuminate darker paths for Link with its flaming sword, teleport via connecting to those annoying phantom eye security drones, and crawl into a ball and roll destructively like a metallic Goron. Above all else, piloting a phantom guard provides a nifty source of camouflage to deflect the guard’s attention to Link’s presence. I don’t know how they aren’t tipped off that there might be a little girl in their midst from the constant wailing for Link to slow down or the high-pitched shrieking whenever a rat crawls around her feet, but I’ll accept their lack of vigilance if it means that Link won’t be forced to scurry away to a pool of imperceptibility at every moment. With Zelda’s distinct set of skills, revisiting the Tower of Spirits is neither a grueling slog nor is it a frantic, frustrating escort quest like Ico with touchpad controls. If anything, it’s the gender-reversed opposite.

Outside of the grandiose Tower of Spirits, Link is expected to carry the weight of heroic duty and Link alone. Fortunately, Spirit Tracks also offers the fabled savior of Hyrule a new slew of untested mechanics in the vein of his items. Before I detail the fresh tricks up the sleeves of Spirit Tracks, I suppose I should mention that the developers deemed either fun or functional enough to return from Phantom Hourglass. Long-distance offense seems to have been the deciding factor, for arrows and the boomerang are the only ones brave enough to show their faces again. You still wanted an item that gives you an excuse to draw on the touchpad, right? If you’re wondering what happened to the hookshot, it’s been replaced with a snaked-faced whip that ultimately functions the same, with the perk of quicker traversal when latching onto the beams. The “Sand Wand” is an especially exciting item, for it allows Link to command large banks of the dry granular material and elevate it at his convenience on the whim of the stylus. If directing sand isn’t stimulating enough, the “Whirlwind” is an item that implements the microphone, creating gusts of wind to forcefully propel enemies and extinguish flames by blowing into the bottom right corner of the DS. The kinetic novelty with this item is certainly nifty, as it feels as if the player’s real breaths are impacting the flow of gameplay. Still, the developers seem to express that picking a direction on a circular plane and exhaling once or twice isn’t challenging enough. Did anyone notice how Phantom Hourglass was an outlier in the Zelda series, as it did not include a musical instrument in any capacity? Well, Spirit Tracks rectifies that glaring omission with what is the most interactive instrument in the series to date, for better or for worse. Link’s musical outlet this time around is a pan flute, a wind instrument that coincides with the kinetic functionality of the DS’s microphone. Notes are symbolized by distinct colors and are scaled from lowest to highest from left to right of the instrument. Like the ocarina, specific bite-sized melodies will affect the environment upon being played and are saved in a journal for the player to use as a visual reference. However, unlike the ocarina, producing any melodious sound is far more enterprising than pressing a series of directional buttons on a controller. The finicky nature of administering air into the pan flute is most prevalent during the duet sequences with a sanctuary’s sage, a process needed to gain access to that area’s dungeon. Link’s practice sessions with the old farts are lengthy enough, but no amount of preparation can prevent the awkward, mismatched snags that come with this kind of kineticism. Thankfully, the sages seem to be understanding and do not angrily ask me if I was rushing or dragging if my pan flute playing wasn’t quite their tempo. Overall, playing the pan flute felt like Plankton running back and forth with a harmonica in “Band Geeks,” or my elementary school days when the staff placed a recorder in front of my face. Yes, notes were played, but with such strenuous conditions involved that I’d hardly call the final product music.

If the player manages to satisfy the sage’s duet requirements, the player should find themselves en route to that area’s dungeon to procure the sacred Macguffin that lies within its deepest layers. Normally, I’d be chomping at the bit to experience the series’ staple labyrinths, but the ones outside of the recurring Tower of Spirits megaplex are rather dull. I really can’t recall much of interest with the first three dungeons, other than that the “Ocean Temple” was unremarkably dry for a dungeon existing underwater. I guess the developers decided not to press their luck in designing a dreaded water level with the unorthodox stylus control scheme. The Fire Temple featured a nifty and complex mine cart segment, while the Sand Temple utilizes its item, the Sand Wand, to the fullest with a myriad of different puzzles and platforming segments. Then again, these types of Sand Wand-oriented instances reappear in droves during the final portion of the Tower of Spirits, which sort of diminishes the distinctiveness of the game’s last elemental palace. I’m thankful that these dungeons are at least competent, but their collective lack of memorable conceits really hurts their impact in the long run.

What salvages these dungeons from totally traveling in one ear and immediately out of the other are the boss battles at their climaxes. Like Phantom Hourglass, the bosses here also serve as examples of the game taking full advantage of the dungeon’s items with the unconventional control scheme at play. Plenty of these pinnacle foes also fully realize the novelty of expanding the scene with the dueling screens of the DS. Gigantic beetle Stagnox will fly upward to the higher portion of the system before trying to ram Link upon reentry, while the green, thorny tentacles of Phytops clog the bottom screen for Link to dodge while he attempts to target the monster’s veiled eyeball that resides in the upper half. Both Cragma and Skeldritch evoke the scope of Eox from Phantom Hourglass, bosses with a skyscraper stature that takes up the space of both screens with its immense verticality, situated in a circular arena where Link is intended to reduce it block by block from below. Above all of these outstanding bosses, the one that impresses me the most is the Demon Train, for it’s a meaty, multiphased foe conquered entirely using the train-conducting skills the player has honed leading up to it. Looking through a less mechanical lens, I’m also quite pleased by the tag team dynamic between Zelda and Link for some of these fights. Both the blonde boy and our dearly departed princess in phantom guard form knock some sense into Byrne at the Tower of Spirits’ peak, and aiming arrows at the backside of Malladus in his demonic physical presence with Zelda while Link distracts his hideousness proves to be a far more engaging collaborative effort than when we trusted NPC Zelda to shoot Ganondorf in Wind Waker. Even Mario and Luigi could learn a thing or two about teamwork from another Nintendo duo that is normally portrayed like Mario and Peach.

Like the kid from that ancient Life cereal commercial, I am in disbelief that I actually like The Legend of Zelda: Spirit Tracks. On the surface, it’s Phantom Hourglass's identical twin still confined to a control scheme that is amusing at best and painfully unintuitive at worst. Still, Spirit Tracks manages to find quality-of-life enhancements when I figured that the foundation was too resolute to work upon. Traversing the overworld is still a bounded excursion, but at least its limitations now make more sense when a railroad system is constructed around it. There still might be a multistoried dungeon with seven floors unlocked per visitation, but at least I no longer anticipate returning with great apprehension because the elements that made the previous mega dungeon insufferable have been omitted and/or reconsidered. Finally, it’s been proven to me that the stylus schematic is not a gimmicky deterrent and that it can foster a functional Zelda experience, but I’d still only recommend it for the series completionists because of its abstract nature. For those who have already seen everything the series has to offer, Spirit Tracks is sounding its deafening train horn to call your attention to it.