Splitter Critters Demo

As indie game developers continue to prove on a regular basis, there are still many ways one can innovate video games with simple ideas. Countless games have started as nothing but crude prototypes that caught the public’s attention, and many of those got to enjoy the bestseller status over the years. Moreover, there are game design competitions nowadays that dare the developers to come up with ingenious ideas in just a few days.

Splitter Critters is a puzzle platformer in which your goal is quite simple: help the tiny aliens get to their spaceship. However, the only tool at your disposal is the ability to cut the game world and shift the pieces around in two dimensions. While it may sound rather straightforward, the game is anything but that, especially after the first introductory levels fly past and you find yourself with a challenge on your hands.

The way it works is that you can either make horizontal or vertical cuts, and the entire level is completely sliced, not just a piece of it. You can drag the desired half in any direction, but you also have to make sure that you arrange the resulting pieces in such a way as to allow the critters to reach their ship. On top of that, it’s also important that you avoid the enemies along the way.

The one rule about the enemies in this game is that they only need to touch a critter once for it to die and cause a level restart. Hence, you must be really careful when you are shifting things around. Not only that, but even your own critters come in different flavors, and some have special abilities as well. Thus, whether they can jump off platforms or actually destroy the enemy creatures by running them over, each type requires a different approach.

As for the technical side of things, Splitter Critters was designed and built in just 72 hours, so it’s only natural that it doesn’t look very flashy. However, the graphics are not bad either, although the lack of variety in the landscapes can lead to boredom. You also have to watch out for bugs and glitches, which is only normal for a prototype version anyway.

When it’s all said and done, Splitter Critters is something new, and the developers deserve our admiration for coming up with such a simple, yet engaging concept. Hence, if you want to see more and help the developers at the same time, you can vote for the game on Steam Greenlight.