Embers of Mirrim Reviews

It looked neat and the idea felt cool but sadly it quickly became very repetitive and tiresome. The game isn't very long but every session felt like a marathon. I've never felt this exhausted after mere 45min session of anything, surely tracking and controlling 2 things at once does a number on you. It's a puzzle room over a puzzle room with pretty much no breather sections which could be rather easily fixed with some exposition segments as the game has 0 tell but also almost no show either in terms of its story or lore. We know we crashed on a planet, had two creatures merged together prolly against their will and then move along clearing some corruption. But why? To what end? Who are we? Are we stuck fused together forever? What's up with the ending saying it's a cycle? There are simply no answers to any of these while a few rooms with wall-paintings could hint this and that immediately adding a lot of depth to it. It really looks like they tried to go for what Ori and the Blind Forest did but didn't quite grasp why it was so great. Surely it's pretty but that's all I can give it. It has one beaten to death mechanic that enforces a controller (keyboard wouldn't handle that many inputs at once anyway, wish the ember-split was a toggle and not hold...). It has escape sequences but often introduces weird camera angle for them making it only harder as you have to re-feel the jump distances and alike; more cinematic sure, but counterproductive. Terrain is rather same-y looking so finding secrets is more jumping to your death 100 times checking the walls or will camera suddenly pan down to reveal a new room. Over all it's pretty, oddly shallow for the implemented artistry and with something unique that doesn't end up being that great in the long run making a not very compelling gameplay.