A 3D Platformer That is Less Than the Sum of its Gorgeous, Inventive Parts
Manairons has all the ingredients to be a special platformer. For a debut indie it’s lavish, and there are moments that you could squint and imagine that you’re playing the next Little Nightmares.
The characters look like they’ve come from a Jim Henson and Terry Pratchett collab, somewhere between Truckers and Gelflings. You’re the size of a thimble, jumping over thumb tacks and pecking chickens. That shift in perspective doesn’t get old. This is very much Honey I Shrunk the Goblin. I’ve always had a soft spot for games that zoom in and make adventures of more mundane environments – games like Grounded and Micro Machines.
There is an offbeat charm to some of the game mechanics, too. You rest in a giant beanbag to restore your health, listening to your gramophone. A Link-homaging flute is both your weapon and your ocarina, and you can learn five songs over the course of Manairons. These songs pull off increasingly outlandish stunts, like moving giant blocks or grappling onto music notes. I quite like that Manairons expects you to learn the musical pieces rather than just pop out some QTEs.
I’m a fan of the crazed bosses, too, with robo-cooks that have whisks for arms and chicken jockeys who charge you down. The story is kind of quaint, taking an anti-industrialist bent, as you look to destroy the inventions of a tyrant baron called Llorenc. And the puzzles are familiar but tactile: you’re often lugging around batteries to socket them in vast mechanical systems. It’s nothing particularly revolutionary, but I enjoyed slowing down to complete sprawling puzzles, rather than tapping into some instant gratification like most other platformers.
I love so, so much of the stuff that makes up Manairons. It’s richly presented, thick with Catalan folklore and texture. The music is evocative. There are lots of collectibles, adding an extra layer to the game, as you spy coins in higher reaches of the game but wonder how on Earth you are going to get there.
I’d Love a Plushie of the Main Character, too
Lay out the component parts of Manairons and I’d have affection for about 80% of them. I genuinely think there is a very, very good game here. But I never, not once, truly enjoyed my time playing it. Manairons is a hot air balloon that is looking to soar, but it’s got some serious ballast holding it down.
Manairons’ big problem is how it feels to play. The old ‘Three Cs’ – combat, character and camera – are all anachronistic, feeling like they have been ported directly from a shonky N64 title. Manairons feels old, and not in a vintage way.
Combat never manages to be more than aimless combos in the general direction of an enemy. You can merrily attack an enemy but find some of the attacks miss for reasons that can’t be readily explained. Manairons has a love for hovering enemies, but never gives the player tools to attack them. We constantly attacked the space above them, as if Manairons wanted us to be at a very specific height. We found it unhealthily convenient to hold back and shoot from afar: something that felt cheesy and unengaging, but clearly the optimal way to play.
The camera is fiercely determined to stay in position, even when it’s actively sabotaging. There were moments where we just couldn’t judge how deep we were into the 2.5D backdrop and ended up flying to the side of a platform or climbing rope, and then onto our doom. 3D spaces pretended to be 2D spaces, zooming out and becoming a momentary Mario game. But we were still very capable of falling off platforms because the depth didn’t present itself.
Manairons 2 will Clearly be a Blast
Platforming and – particularly – climbing never feels right. There’s something iffy about the collision detection that means you can alleyoop over a mousetrap or similar obstacle but still nick yourself on it. Ladders and ropes are a constant hassle, as the wee main character refuses to attach unless you approach from a very specific angle. And even though there’s a helpful circle that appears where you’re going to land, it’s often too late.
I could see the game that Manairons wanted us to play. It looked great. Sure, there isn’t anything revolutionary about the battery-focused puzzles and the hacky-slashy combat, but it’s not hard to imagine the highly competent, beautiful game that Manairons could have been. It sounds like a backhanded compliment, but I could definitely imagine a publisher coming to 3Cat with their Smurfs, Garfield or Trolls and asking them to whip up a quick licensed title.
A Wonderful World, Tied Up
I felt like I was in Disneyland with my shoelaces tied together. I could see a wonderful world that I wanted to explore, characters I wanted to meet (and grapple with). But I was sabotaged. The underlying systems, the stuff on the sticks, got in the way, rather than facilitated the whole experience. It was such a constant, niggling shame as we played Manairons.
3Cat are absolutely a studio to watch. They clearly have abundant talent in their artists, audio developers and level designers. But Manairons is unwieldy, and it doesn’t end up being the showcase that the developers deserve. It’s merely a decent platformer, when so much of Manairons feels drafted from an excellent one.
Important Links
A Flute, A Factory And Furious Little Creatures – Manairons Launches On Xbox – https://www.thexboxhub.com/a-flute-a-factory-and-furious-little-creatures-manairons-launches-on-xbox/
Buy from the Xbox Store – https://www.xbox.com/en-gb/games/store/manairons/9P6QV96KLN6S
