Dodger

Jumping over obstacles is a classic trope in platformers, since it was featured even by the first games in the genre. However, the recipe is not as simple to follow as you might think, because the mechanics have to click in a certain way, otherwise frustration enters the equation. On top of all this, the controls must be accurate as well, not to mention responsive and intuitive.

Dodger is a 2D platformer in which your goal is to navigate treacherous levels as smoothly as possible and keep an eye on the timer while doing so. Unfortunately, there are no new gameplay mechanics to talk about, since most of your time is spent simply jumping from one platformer to the other, but the overall experience can be challenging enough to keep boredom at bay.

To begin with, you play the role of a nameless man whose task is to run across a variety of landscapes as quickly as possible, for some reason. Enemies and traps make your mission a lot harder, on the other hand, since you really have to watch your step. As an example, spikes cause instant death, which in turn causes a whole level restart and you have to take it from the top.

As mentioned before, there’s a time limit you have to uphold, and it’s usually just a few seconds. Thankfully, you can pick up bonuses and increase your time limit, and it’s actually mandatory to do so in order to make it to the end. It can be a bit too much sometimes, and would have been a great idea to make this thing optional, but you can still learn to deal with the stressful mechanics.

Lastly, the graphics are nothing to write home about either, but they don’t matter as much in a platformer anyway. Even so, at least the level design could have used a bit more work, because at the moment each level looks almost the same from start to finish. Thankfully, at least the theme and the backgrounds change when you move on to a new stage.

Even if Dodger lacks the original factor when it comes to story or gameplay mechanics, the challenging levels can still keep you busy for a while. However, it’s certainly not the kind of video game that lures you back in multiple times over the years.