Lenna's Inception

I have a soft spot for games that quietly subvert the premise on the title screen, and Lenna's Inception does exactly that in its opening minutes. The prophesied hero dies in the tutorial dungeon, unceremoniously, and reluctant tutor Lenna is left holding a sword she never asked for. That setup alone signals that Bytten Studio, a two-person Brighton team with roots at Chucklefish on Starbound and Stardew Valley's multiplayer, built this with affection and a dry sense of humour rather than rote genre obligation. The bones are unmistakably Link's Awakening. Top-down movement, screen-by-screen exploration, dungeons unlocked by items that also gate the overworld, a Metroidvania-ish drip of new verbs. The twist is procedural generation: every new save reshuffles the overworld layout and, crucially, the order in which you clear dungeons two through seven, meaning the item you grab first changes each time and subtly rewires the whole pacing. A daily seed mode ties the community to a shared map, and you can type in custom seeds to compare routes with friends. The writing riding on top of all this is genuinely funny and restrained. Pop culture references are tucked into optional collectibles rather than shoved into cutscenes, and the central joke about a glitching video-game kingdom earns its weirdness rather than just announcing it. Where Lenna's Inception loses its footing is inside the dungeons themselves. The procedural rooms frequently produce wide, empty corridors that feel assembled rather than designed. Puzzles are simple to the point of invisibility, and the combat, while serviceable with its range of weapons and shields, rarely demands more than pattern recognition. The boss fights are the exception: they are the sharpest thing in the game, each one creatively matched to the dungeon's gimmick and balanced well enough that first attempts feel dangerous without being punishing. The final dungeon reportedly introduces a genuinely novel mechanic that retrospectively justifies the whole structure, though I will leave that as a reward to discover. There is also a local co-op mode unlocked in-game where a second player takes control of Shadow Lenna, and a handful of companion characters add some personality to the road: Henrietta the chicken, Gourdon the sentient pumpkin, a librarian who hurls books with aggressive precision. The two graphic modes, switchable 8-bit and 32-bit pixel art, are both charming, and the soundtrack has been praised loudly enough across player communities that it deserves the attention. If glitch-effect visuals bother you, there is a toggle for those too. For fans of Cassette Beasts wondering where Bytten Studio started: this is it, and Lenna herself turns up as a secret boss in that later game. As a debut, it shows all the craft you would expect from that team, alongside the roughness you forgive a first release. If you want hand-crafted dungeon artistry, look elsewhere. If you want a wry, replayable Zelda riff with bosses worth fighting and writing worth reading, this one quietly earns your afternoon.

Kai · Scout Team

Indie & narrative

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