So there’s no Indie Wonderland this week. And the reason for that is weirder than usual.
I’ve been playing One Bit Beyond‘s The Swords Of Ditto, a cute and colourful Zelda-esque about delving dungeons and beating evils over many successive generations. It has interesting theming, both in the immediately visual way the world is shaped (ex. the ‘Toys of Legend’) and in the underlying story that slowly emerges as you recover more and more logs. As well as some other stuff.
The problem is that I think there’s more to this game than I’m currently getting. Without getting too in-depth, on a surface level, I started getting a little bored with The Swords Of Ditto in my second run. It’s mechanically not very tough, and the heavily-lampshaded repetition starts to grate soon. But all the same, it’s very strongly implied that there’s supposed to be more: That all the repetition and the strange game design and the heavy lampshading is leading to some sort of breaking of the mold. If that does happen, it has the potential to be very interesting.
I just haven’t found it yet.
So, in a fairly unprecedented Indie Wonderland move, I want to give The Swords Of Ditto another week. If there is something more, I’d feel bad about writing what’s essentially an incomplete review. But if I can’t find what I’m thinking to find in two weeks time, it doesn’t really matter whether it’s ‘really’ there or not.
Check back in next week for the exciting conclusion!
– Jarenth