Under the Island
Developer: Slime King Games
Publisher: Top Hat Studios
Platforms: PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4, Switch, Xbox Series X/S (Reviewed), PC
Release Date: Available Now
Price: $19.99 USD – Available Here
Overview
There’s a reason some classic games never go out of style and part of it is thanks to the fact that, not only were they revolutionary at their time, they happen to be the very same games that modern day developers look to for inspiration. One such indie developer, Slime King Games, has clearly taken a lot of inspiration for their first ever game Under the Island, looking to put their own spin on things and set players out on an island spanning adventure filled with puzzles, collectables, and four key objects to find scattered across the land. The question is, does this indie game stand up on its own or does it fall short of what it aspires to hearken back to?
Story
Nia is a tomboy who wishes she could spend her summer playing with her friends, but unfortunately her archeologist parents are dragging her to the remote Seashell Island over the summer to investigate the unique history and many ancient ruins that dot the landscape. With the island being surrounded by terrible storms for three months, there’s little Nia can do but explore and soon find herself coming across the local shrine and town native Avocado who warns her not to touch it. Yet, of course, Nia does, and triggers a pitfall that sends both Avocado and herself into a strange ruin where an even stranger being from a species long-forgotten by history warns them that the island is in danger.
Four gears that were meant to maintain the island’s inner-workings have gone missing and without them the island will sink beneath the waves. Heeding the advice that these gears trigger strange events whenever they appear, Nia and Avocado (but almost entirely Nia) must track down these gears to save the island and perhaps find even more secrets along the way as there is far more than just Koala Village and some lovely beaches under this island.
Under the Island tells a fairly simple and straightforward tale that is a bit more childish in nature as many of the encounters and events that take place are far more unique than one would expect. While we won’t spoil them here, most boss battles in the game don’t simply involve beating down a bad-guy that stole a gear, but doing some unusual task or series of tasks to assist someone instead or, if it does come to a beatdown, it is usually for something just as ridiculous in nature which is quite humorous. It is a bit unfortunate that the game doesn’t quite live up to its potential in some areas however as the townsfolk have just enough personality to feel interesting but not enough to actually go anywhere.
For example, a few characters will spring extra side-quests on the player to resolve a conflict or fix an issue for a reward but that’s about it, despite featuring the entire town of Koala Village and numerous other smaller villages players will travel to. This lack of potential also arises from the various secrets and hidden locations that players can find. Hidden notes, tucked away ancient artworks, and even entire facilities and locations that hint at more than what is eventually revealed are either entirely optional or given no further elaboration. This is a bit of nice extra content for fans that want to do everything available, but also leaves fans wanting more from a world that isn’t quite deep enough to deliver.
Gameplay
Nia’s journey through Seashell Island is a familiar one that isn’t too complex but one that is filled with possibilities and plenty of hidden secrets to unveil. Since the legendary sword was apparently already taken, Nia wields a hockey stick in its place and utilizes a three-hit combo string to attack and defeat enemies. The game’s combat is quick and fairly responsive with players being able to run out of the way and keep an eye on enemy movements to properly time Nia’s swings to knock them back. Depending on how much extra exploration players undertake, Nia can trigger a small shockwave with her final attack and even perform a series of dashing attacks as well.
This means that Under the Island is far from a hard game, though players may find themselves falling prey to enemies that are far stronger than others if they go too far, though usually Lemon, a cartographer in the game and collector, warns players if they are entering a tough region and aren’t upgraded enough. Upgrades come in a variety of forms but the key one happens to be heart coins that are scattered all over the island. They are in chests, buried behind rocks, hidden in tree-stumps, locked in lockers, and even in an arcade machine. For every four heart coins players obtain M. Uscle, a bodybuilder, will add an extra heart to Nia’s total health gauge and most bosses will also reward a free heart as well.
Other upgrades vary fairly wildly and also depend on how much players tend to explore and want to unlock since some of them are entirely optional. They are also incredibly mislabeled. A mystic bear in Koala Village will upgrade most of the tools that Nia finds in her journey to increase their damage, how much they heal, treasure detection, and more. Each upgrade costs a certain amount of money as well as materials obtained either from enemies or honey located hidden throughout the world in a manner similar to heart coins. The only problem is, at least on the Xbox version of the game, every item displays honey (the hardest to come by material) as being required for every upgrade of every item. That isn’t the case however as the actual ingredient needed is displayed to the left, but this can make players hesitant to waste their resources if they are trying to save up and unaware of the glitched labeling.
True to the game that inspired it and the adventure RPG genre as a whole, Under the Island is more than willing to make players backtrack to areas they’ve been before once they’ve progressed the story and obtained new exploration tools. Various paths will be blocked off by holes in the ground that can only be filled with a shovel, boulders blocking a path that can only be blown apart by a bomb, or even switches or weights that can only be reached with a bird companion. This does encourage retracing steps for those that want to see everything the game has to offer, especially since some incredibly powerful items are the most optional ones, including one that lays deep within a haunted location and another that requires solving multiple mini-puzzles within Koala Town itself, but is a bit annoying as there are also no indicators where these locations previously were. This means players will either need to rely on memory or simply explore again and hope they remember where the shortcut or hidden pathway can now be accessed.
That being said, with so many tools at the player’s disposal for exploration it also means that the puzzles also have just as much variety to work with and that is where Under the Island really shines. None of them are truly mind-benders, though a few require some outside the box thinking, but there is so much variety here that players will stay engaged all the way through until the very last dungeon. Speaking of dungeons, while the standard enemies are fairly run-of-the-mill and a bit generic with re-skins in various locations, the boss battles are exceptional. As mentioned earlier most boss battles feature unique elements that differ from simply beating down an enemy. These are often little puzzles in their own right trying to figure out the proper way to expose an opening or trigger the required effect, keeping players engaged even if they’ve explored the entire island and gathered nearly every collectable.
Now, there are a few issues that plague Under the Island and while one happens to be rather difficult to control but, thankfully one time only unless players are aiming for the achievement, snowboard mini-game, there are a couple others that are significant issues. The first is the fact that at the moment the game does not properly save upon completing the game, giving players a chance to return to the island and “clean-up” anything they might have missed as intended, and secondly is another save issue that is far more dire. For unknown reasons that happened twice, the game refused to actually save despite saving at the various shrine-like locations scattered throughout the world.
Players cannot see their save slot to know that the save worked properly but are told that the game was saved properly, only to load the title back up to find that their save file is missing an entire dungeon’s worth of progress. In another case it required completing a number of side-objectives before the final dungeon once again just to gather items up again since the save file forgot entirely to actually save the game. Ironically, one of these discoveries came when the game hard-crashed due to an unknown error appearing when the player’s bird companion was damaged with a bomb, forcing a quit that also revealed that none of the saves had worked for over an hour.
Audio & Visuals
Seashell Island features a colorful and vibrant array of locations to explore and each area in Under the Island is surprisingly varied between deep-woods to mountains covered in snow and more. Each location will feature enemies designed, or slightly altered, for that location and the pixel character models themselves are quite impressive with their chibi designs. The few character portraits are also decent, though not too impressive overall.
The title does not feature any voice work but it does feature a rather nice collection of background music with there being eighteen songs in total that players can even obtain as collectables and listen to at any time in their home, though at the moment two tapes are currently glitched as well thanks to aforementioned save issues.
Overall
Under the Island does feature some rather underwhelming storytelling despite the potential it hints at but strong combat, varied and clever puzzle design, and a ton of optional but engaging side-content make this an adventure to remember even if it does wear its inspirations as clear as day. Unfortunately, between some generic re-used enemy designs and a number of bugs that are not only noticeable but can downright erase hours of progress if they trigger, let’s hope that Slime King Games can patch up these holes and make sure this island runs as smooth as it plays.
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