New Hand-Drawn 3D Platformer Is Bursting With Nintendo Inventiveness

There was another 3D platform with a 2D protagonist. I think it was called Demon Turf and I found it a bit weird to manoeuvre it. I like the way it looks though. Let's see

Gameplay looks great, but I'll be honest--the main character disturbs me a little bit. He doesn't look like an anthropomorphic animal but more like an adult male in a furry suit. Maybe society has just corrupted me, but I can't look at something like this without feeling like there's weird NSFW undertones. I can't be the only one, right...? Maybe it's completely innocuous and I've just been terminally online for too long. That's probably it.

Either way though, this game won't be an immediate purchase for me despite 3D platformers being my favorite genre because there's frankly too many of them on the market right now, especially by indies. The indie ones in many cases have been a bit underwhelming to me, and I don't see me playing through them a second time.

That's not to say I regret purchasing them necessarily, but as Nikoderiko went on for example, the cracks started showing, and despite having really solid controls and level design that rivals even DKC, it's littered with game-breaking bugs. I've gotten softlocked probably five times in my playthrough, and I gave up on the final boss because sometimes the hit boxes just wouldn't work and I couldn't damage him.

Kao the Kangaroo is another where I just felt like "Eh, it was alright, but not sure if I need to revisit it." It was certainly more polished (although I do distinctly remember losing progress in Kao because there was a save data bug at launch), but it was still just kind of middling.

I beat the first world in Demon Turf but just never continued because I didn't find it all that fun for whatever reason. (I'll go back to it eventually and give it another chance, though.) I have other games in my wishlist like Lunistice, Corn Kidz 64, and Spark The Electric Jester, but I honestly feel at this point that I'm forcing myself to play these obscure 3D platformers because I feel compelled to play every game in the genre.

For the longest time, we just weren't getting any 3D platformers at all. Once they gained popularity again with games like Mario Odyssey, Crash N. Sane Trilogy, Spyro Reignited Trilogy, and SpongeBob Rehydrated, it was easy to keep up at first. But now, I feel like they're becoming as common as RPG's, with several releasing every year.

When they were more rare, I could look past the faults of a game like Yooka-Laylee and still love it because it filled a void. But that void has been filled now and then some, so I'm not sure I have the willingness to buy a lot of b-tier platformers anymore as it's getting increasingly expensive and time-consuming to play them all. Even Penny's Big Breakaway, which did have a lot going for it, felt like a bit of a slog for me to finish. I think I'm just getting burned out on running and jumping.

Moving forward, I think I'll dial it back to the 3D platformers from major publishers for now, like whatever Ubisoft is planning for Rayman, a possible Spyro 4, and whatever Mario and Kirby do next. One big exception would be if A Hat in Time gets a sequel, though--I'd be there day one.

Don't get me wrong, this is a good problem to have. I'd rather the market be oversaturated with 3D platformers than to not get any at all, which was the case for probably close to a decade outside Mario and Sonic.

@Not_Soos Hmm, I think to me the character just seemed like a weird lil guy, but not NSFW. I think it's that the character's design elements don't quite go together but sort of do, so it gives an unsettling impression.

I think this game looks really cool! But the most promising thing in that trailer seems to be that the "you are going downhill chased by a thing" level looks actually fun with fluid movement. Could be good!

@Macnemo79 Yeah, I don't personally like flat characters in a 3D platformer. Makes it difficult to measure the depth/distances as well as the momentum that the character is having.

@World Yeah, it's very uncanny. I'm fine with his weird chibi anime face, but his stocky figure and running animations are too humanoid and I find it disturbing. Comparing his design to Banjo, another anthropomorphic platforming bear, I don't get that same unsettling vibe. Banjo has dopey animations that aren't exactly bear-like, but they don't feel like a human either. Whatever this character is doing with his hands is a bit too over-the-top for me as well, since you'll be looking at that the whole game. It's like they're trying too hard to make him a meme, but it doesn't work for me.

It's like Mario grabbed the Tanooki leaf but something went horribly wrong...

Pretty much ditto. The game looks to have plenty of potential, but the main character's visual and aural design is putting me off a bit. Not insurmountably, but my hype is tempered by it.

I want to like it but watching the videos I miss some frames in the protagonist‘s running animation and unfortunately to me, the 2D characters break the hierarchy of what’s important and what’s not. I’m supposed to interact with an NPC or enemy that looks just like a negligible collectible …
I love the music and overall weird vibe though, and thanks so much to the devs for trying something new! Guess I’ll just wait for some reviews.

The screenshots don't do justice to the art style. Watch the trailer instead. Pretty unique. I'll wait for the reviews/commentaries, but I'm interested.

Looks ok imo. Should be called Wicket and the Forest of Endor though.

@Not_Soos Idk, I'm not getting those vibes you guys are. Its very cartoony and I will say I think they need to tone down the character's expressions, but other than that it has those goofy vibes that are common with mascot platformers

The character looks wildly disconnected from the rest of the world. It's not just the 2D/3D split, which I get is a thing, but the styles are very divergent.

That looks pretty darn cool.

Ruffy's happy hands crack me up. 🤣

At first I was interested, because of the artstyle and now I am even more interested, because the gameplay seems to be fun.

Looks pretty nice and fun actually, and I'm not usually taken with these sort of unknown indie sorts

@Tipehtfomottob I also was thinking all along it's an Ewok

This guy is clearly an ewok.

Looks promising, doesn't look that different than Paper Mario in regards to how flat character interact with the crafter world.

Everyone seems fine except the main character, something about him smiling all the time is a little off-putting for me.

This looks incredible.... it took a few seconds to grow on me how the models were being rotated and animated but it is super unique and surreal. Definitely keeping this on my radar if it gets a physical release. Reminds me of the quirkily whimsical games from the Playstation 1 and Saturn.

Readers hate this one weird headline format!

@Not_Soos Yeah I see what you mean its movement is erratic and like you said before they're a bit too humanoid.

It makes the characters come off as unhinged rather than charming. Even the idle animation is too much lol.

There’s something jarring to me about having a character moving on 6-12 fps when the rest of the world and the camera moves at 30-60 fps.

I've been watching this game for a while and now that it is further along in development it is starting to look kinda iffy to me. Everything seems very chaotic and barely functional to me in this preview video. The character designs seem to have also gotten... worse? I was originally fully on board a year ago and now feel like I will wait for it to be cheap or included in a Steam bundle to try it.

I swear when I first saw the thumbnail I thought it was an Ewok game or something.

@Not_Soos As someone who is similarly burned out on the oversaturated genre, I would strongly recommend picking up Corn Kidz 64. I was pleasantly surprised by what a breath of fresh air it was. Great platforming and level design. Plus the levels are super densely packed with secrets. It can be a short game if you're not doing everything, but if you're a completionist, it's a surprisingly good size game for how cheap it is.

It's like putting Paper Mario in a Banjo-Kazooie world, it looks nice but the sprites and world doesn't mesh that well. While the characters and enemies are flat, the world is ugly and choppy. The camerawork may also need a bit of polish, it seems to be quite unstable in the trailer. I for once though had no issue with the character, it looks like a uniquely design masked bear-like character, may even be fit for a mascot if given the chance.

Is this an Unreal engine game? When the camera rotates and pans, there is that characteristic Unreal engine stutter. It gives me a headache. Also I have concerns that Switch won’t run this game well at all.

@sketchturner

Cool, I'll definitely keep it in mind. I know Nitro Rad gave high praise to that game--he's probably the only reason I even know about it--but there's been at least a couple different times I've bought a game Nitro Rad gave a strong recommendation for and wound up being a little disappointed with it. Demon Turf and Sphynx: The Cursed Mummy both fall into that camp. (Granted, I didn't get very far into either of them. Maybe they would click with me if I kept going.)

I get strong Cavern of Dreams vibes from Corn Kidz. Have you played that one? If so, how would you say it compares? I played Cavern of Dreams when it came to Switch I think at the beginning of this year, and it was interesting--a very surreal, occasionally unsettling take on Banjo-Kazooie. But I got a little frustrated in that game trying to figure out where I needed to go next. I liked it, but I don't know if I see myself ever replaying it. I don't necessarily want one-and-done experiences, but rather games I'll want to come back to again and again over the years. Like Mario 64--that's a game I replay annually. A lot of indie 3D platformers haven't been doing that for me.

This could be awesome but that doesn't look like a bear. It looks like a bear body and some kind of.... weird... human face?? I dunno, it freaks me out.

It reminds me a lot of Sonic Robo Blast 2!

this gave me motion sickness after five seconds

@Not_Soos I haven't played Cavern of Dreams, but I've been on the fence about whether I want to buy it or not. Looks interesting but I wasn't sure how I felt about the lack of combat. Not to mention my burnout on indie platformers has made me wary, much like you.

It looks like it has potential but there's times when the differences between levels shown is really stark - some look like badly uprezzed N64 while some look absolutely lovely. The frame rate seems all over the place as well. Cue motion-sickness & headache for me