



It’s becoming increasingly more difficult to bring something new to the platform genre, as not even adding puzzles is enough by itself to qualify for one’s own place. As such, Ethan: Meteor Hunter has its work cut out, since the small indie game from French developer Seaven Studio works with these elements, plus time and space manipulation, which is equally overused. There’s a decent attempt to switch paces, but it’s unsure whether the sum of its parts will be enough to distance itself from the masses.

Visually, the game succeeds in keeping a slick overview of side-scrolling stages with large locations and platform sections. Though we only saw uniformly brownish color schemes so far, some color touches in moats and such give us a hint of change. Players control a mouse, as it tries to overcome a set of obstacles in a manner of ways. Its simplest asset is to jump or use momentum by sliding down a hill to leap over larger gaps. More importantly, it can collect nodes to stop time and displace interactive objects, to reposition these over gaps or create stairs to get to higher positions. Elements like water or fire are added to give the reactive physics a little more weight. Auxiliary items such as springs and saws will further layer content for a different set of platform needs. It’s standard stuff, but if it keeps expanding accordingly, it may be enough to appeal to at least its core demographic. For a short gameplay commentary with more info, you can check below.



Daav Valentaten, NoobFeed. (@Daavpuke)