The Land of Eyas

My soft spot for small, weird, slightly-too-hard platformers made me stick with The Land of Eyas longer than most people probably will, and I think that's worth being upfront about. Happy Square Productions built this around a single mechanical idea: every level is split into two halves, each pulling Eyas in an opposite direction. The upper half drags him down; the lower half pushes him up. Crossing that threshold isn't just a toggle - you carry momentum from one gravity zone into the other, and that slingshot energy is the whole vocabulary of the game. Threading a well-timed crossing to rocket up to an otherwise unreachable ledge feels genuinely clever when it clicks, and the 30 levels do build on the concept with locked doors, directional crates, arrow objects that obey fixed gravities, and hazards including spikes, saws, and gears that require precise timing and positioning. The atmosphere is where I found myself giving it the most grace. The 2D visuals are soft and considered, with varied biome backdrops that keep the world from feeling repetitive on the eyes even when the design sometimes veers that way. The soundtrack has that gentle, slightly wistful quality that the best small-budget platformers use to paper over their rough edges - it genuinely makes you want to persist through a frustrating section rather than quit. Eyas himself, this small amnesiac boy in a cat suit guided by tree wisps toward a figure called M.O.T.H.E.R., is a likeable enough vessel, though the narrative is thin. Collecting Seer Stones uncovers fragments of lost memory, but the storytelling never quite generates the pull it needs to make you emotionally invested in the journey home. That said, the friction is real and you should know what you are walking into. Checkpoints are sparse, death is frequent, and the game expects pixel-level accuracy on its tougher stretches. The sprint mechanic requires a deliberate button press, and Eyas takes a moment to build speed, which can feel punishing mid-platforming sequence, especially on a controller. Some of the larger levels have camera framing issues that put obstacles just outside comfortable sight lines. There is also a recurring critique from players that the game introduces ideas without quite teaching you how to use them, and that critique holds up: the game trusts you to figure it out, which is occasionally charming and occasionally maddening. Character development is absent entirely - no new moves, no upgrades, just the same Eyas with the same toolkit across all 30 levels. For the player who enjoys the pure, austere pleasures of a precision platformer with a gentle aesthetic, The Land of Eyas occupies a specific niche comfortably. It nods toward the influence of Braid and Super Meat Boy without fully inhabiting either - it is softer than the latter and more mechanically focused than the former. There is a global leaderboard for speedrunners who want to wring time-trial value out of a short game, which is a thoughtful addition. This is a debut title from an indie team that found one genuinely interesting idea, built around it honestly, and did not overstay the welcome in terms of length. Its faults feel like resource constraints and inexperience rather than carelessness. If the soundtrack and the melancholy little cat suit speak to you at all, this one rewards the patient. Kai, Scout Team

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