When I made the switch from Twitter to Bluesky, I lost track of hundreds of indie games, my own personal burning of the Library of Alexandria. As time passed, I forgot a lot of the details of what I saw from those games and never found them again on Bluesky. Legend faded into myth, and some things that should not have been forgotten were lost.
Among those was a top-down action game with crisp and clean pixel art, starring a young woman in a backwards hat, baseball tee, and short jean shorts. Call it fate, luck, or what have you, but when Under the Island came back under my radar, I pinpointed it immediately, and it felt like reconnecting with a lost book.
Under the island’s art direction is unmistakable. The character portraits reminded me of the less popular Disney film Atlantis, with a touch of MS Paint. As Under the Island is layered with references and visual motifs to the 90s era, this is exactly the kind of imagery that should be present in the game. Outside of dialogue, Under the Island has striking visual clarity. It’s easy to identify what’s interactable and what enemies are doing, all while retaining its charm.
Mechanically, Under the Island proudly follows the blueprint laid out in The Legend of Zelda series. If you’re familiar with any classic top-down Zelda game, then you’ve got a leg up on the mechanics here. I think this works in the game’s favour. As you journey your way across Seashell Island’s various environments, Nia, the protagonist, will acquire items that will serve to complete each of the game’s four main dungeons with functionality outside of battle to unlock goodies and reach the next area.
Under the Island boasts some of the most creative items I’ve seen for dungeon clearing. It has a mixed effect, and it reminded me how sometimes the tried-and-true abilities have become tried-and-true. On the other hand, when the abilities work out well for combat or a creative puzzle, then the feeling is electric.
The one mechanic that best illustrates this dichotomy is the Animal Treat item. With these, you can drop treats on the ground and lure animals to specific spots. This opens up previously cordoned-off parts of the world outside the dungeon where you unlock the Animal Treats. Buttons that stubbornly pop right back up after you step off them won’t resist when a buffalo stands on top of them, happy to continuously munch on a treat.
In one area, you can bait rams into charge attacks, which make short work of tanky enemies that stalk the zone. However, when you’re in the heat of the moment and you need an animal to behave in a specific way, then Murphy’s law kicks in. I found myself frustrated in one section at the unreliability of the ram to continue charging when the design demanded it.
The final item that you obtain is by far my favourite. It’s not entirely a new idea – it’s been used plenty of times before – but Slime King Games’ creative design felt unbounded by its implementations. And upon reflection, its use felt almost too obvious and surprisingly unused much before.
These abilities, in addition to the other critical path and unrequired ones, make for a small map with immense depth. Its design pulls you in several directions simultaneously. It strikes the right balance between leading you towards main objectives while letting you zigzag your way to the end. While I think it would be possible to speed to the finale in a few hours, Seashell Island offers dozens of tucked-away cracked walls begging for a bomb, hidden fishing ponds, and offbeat mini-games for prizes. The most impressive part was that Under the Island never ceased to delight with its many offshoot offerings.
Incentives are well placed. Each pathway led to upgrade materials, cash, or a piece of heart, which felt equally rewarding for time spent exploring. While I hadn’t scrounged out every collectible or upgrade, I found that when I would veer off the main path, I never left disappointed.
Upon entering certain areas, NPCs would warn that monsters within are considerably more dangerous than what you’ve run into before. Each one reminds you to return to the main hub, Koala Village, to visit a specific vendor who will upgrade your damage and key combat items. The advice should be heeded since enemies routinely increase in damage and health in a step-by-step structure. I unlocked nearly all major upgrades before the final area and was grateful for the extra work I put in as preparation.
The gameplay makes for an enjoyable package, even when a mini-game or puzzle stumped me, or a mechanic hiccupped more often than expected. The storyline, however, was uneven in its execution.
Playing as Nia, a teenager out on a forced trip with her professor-archaeologist parents, she grumpily steps out of the family car and sets foot on Seashell Island. Within 5 minutes, I’m desecrating local culture, nearly killing the local tour guide girl, Avocado, and learning that Seashell Island is a built megastructure with an expiration date. It’s clear that the developers wanted to throw you into the action. The pace was breakneck, and from there the story fumbles forward in spurts. It’s largely a whimsical affair and felt a bit like a coming-of-age, life-changing summer adventure, although I certainly forgot the plot, distracted by each shiny object glinting in the corner of my eye. Loot and creative puzzles drove me through Under the Island.
I felt like the narrative is designed around getting to know as many NPCs as possible. When I moved from each area to the next, there always seemed to be some missing pieces to the story. At one point, Avocado and I were upset with each other, and I never really understood why. Things quickly got resolved over the course of a mandatory mini-dungeon. It’s a playful world with many anthropomorphised characters, but I never found a strong thread to string everything together. When I approached the game as a chain linked with episodic whims, I settled in more comfortably with the story and characters, though I didn’t end my experience emotionally attached to anyone.
At the game’s close, I sat back in my chair immensely satisfied with the game, start to finish. Like a good book, there were riveting chapters and others that stagnated with too much detail spent on a small plot event. However, the game lives up to its goals and carves its own path away from its inspirations with inventive abilities and dungeons, making for a strong adventure.
