A bit overdue, but today I checked out Slime-san [Steam, Official Site], an incredibly fast-paced platformer with a unique visual style. Disclosure: Key provided by the developer.
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There I was minding my own business, doing whatever a Slime does, when a massive worm gobbled me up. In Slime-san you're battling against the clock to escape from this colossal worm, but it's certainly not an easy task.
You need to be a quick thinker and a quick mover, as you're battling against the digestive system here. If you take too long on a level, the digestive acid will start filling up making it even more difficult to escape.
Being a Slime and all you do have a few abilities at your disposal. While you can't stick to surfaces, you can slowly slide down a wall, meaning it gives you the ability to quickly bounce upwards, Super Meat Boy style. You can also phase through cracked walls, do a single bounce mid-air to bridge a big gap and also dash forwards to make some carefully timed jumps. Thanks to these abilities, the small sections of each level have some real quality design to them. You will need to carefully time phasing through something, to make a quick dash onto another platform and the amount of failure I've had with it is truly amazing.
The game is actually pretty massive too! Not only does it have hundreds and levels each with multiple rooms, there's even a town inside this worm where you can unlock various items! Yes, the worm is just that big. You can play mini-games, change your accessories and more. You can even adjust your character, to have a different play-style. There's a surprising amount of content hidden in the game that I didn't realize at first, be sure to explore the town!
I must say, this is easily some of the most fun I've had in a long time with a platformer. It's incredibly cheery with a fantastic chiptune sound-track that had me tapping along on my gamepad as I travelled through the worm. Clever level design, clever controls and just a delight to play.
For the livestreamers amongst us, there's also some level of Twitch integration. You can let viewers vote on changes, see that chat and more.
The Linux version worked perfectly and it feels fantastic with the Steam Controller, with no config adjustments needed. A game I just can't help but absolutely adore, do check it out.
If it offers enough to be unique and engaging then I guess it might make a fun little time waster.
The little mini-arcade games are quite neat time-wasters that rip off established genres, and we spent a bunch of time watching him go through a Zelda-esque one fighting off progressively harder waves of baddies.
Then, 'oh, right, there's this platformer main game to get back to!'.
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