MainFrames is an ideal instance of a recreation with a intelligent concept that doesn’t overstay its welcome.
Within the new indie platformer, you play as an lovable floppy disk that traverses pc desktops. The aesthetic is ridiculously charming: the various characters sprinkled all through the sport are so dang cute, and the degrees are full of software home windows and desktop icons that function bouncing pads or gears to alter issues within the ranges. Every thing is overlaid on pixelated panorama pc backgrounds that differ between worlds. And it’s all backed by a catchy chiptune soundtrack that basically sells the vibe.
It’s an amazing premise, and MainFrames takes the thought one step additional by commonly letting you manipulate pc home windows by clicking or dragging them such as you would with an precise mouse. So, for instance, for those who can’t attain a far-off ledge, you may be capable of hop onto a pc window with a platform and drag that window over to the ledge so you possibly can attain it. You’ll additionally “choose” sure home windows to activate capabilities like flipping gravity.
Over the course of the sport, you’ll tackle progressively tougher platforming puzzles that require exactly timed jumps and manipulating home windows in numerous methods. There are many completely different approaches for exploring every stage, and it’s value combing by them to see as a lot as you possibly can. One in all my favourite sections had me retrieving tissues for a clock with a chilly. Just a few instances, I ran right into a espresso cup making espresso at a espresso machine. As soon as, I even came across a photograph memorializing someone’s canine.
Among the platforming puzzles are fairly tough. However if you fail a soar or run into an impediment, you respawn straight away, so it’s straightforward to throw your self at a problem as many instances as you could beat it. I used to be capable of skip by some rooms by being sensible about the place I used to be leaping, and whereas I felt fairly pleased with myself, I’ve a hunch the sport’s builders deliberately designed a few of these shortcuts. You too can activate accessibility options like invincibility or infinite jumps to breeze by something you simply can’t get previous, and I’m not ashamed to confess that I did so for a handful of areas close to the top of the sport.
Whereas taking part in MainFrames, I saved drawing comparisons to Celeste. Each are sensible platformers with nice vibes that may get fairly robust, however as a result of reloads are so fast, repeated failures don’t sting too badly. And each video games really feel like they play out their concepts precisely so far as they should. I rolled credit on MainFrames in a bit of underneath 4 hours, and the expertise felt excellent.
MainFrames is now obtainable on Nintendo Change and PC.