Unbound: Worlds Apart Review

It doesn’t matter the month, it doesn’t matter the year; for as long as gaming has been at the forefront of entertainment for consumers, platforming titles have been churned out one after the other. From the early global hits such as Mario, Crash Bandicoot and Spyro, all the way to the more recent adventures such as Ori and the Blind Forest, Celeste or Hollow Knight, amongst countless other lesser-known, but equally fantastic gems.

One of the more recent platforming efforts to arrive on Xbox consoles is that of Unbound: Worlds Apart and if you are partial to a challenging puzzle Metroidvania type experience that can offer atmosphere, quality and brilliance from start to finish, then this is a game you need amongst your digital library.

From the off, it would be quite easy to point to the aforementioned Hollow Knight as a focus of inspiration for Unbound: Worlds Apart, due to the hand-drawn art style and charming music, but it has to be said that what we have here is a game well worthy of a spot amongst the greats rather than being a comparison to what came before.

The game puts you into the shoes of a young mage named Soli, a mage who is one of many others whose job is to link worlds together and protect their lands from corruption. When corruption itself comes calling, however, Soli’s job is made much more difficult, as it’s not just your world, but every world that needs protection when the safety of other mages is put at risk.

By way of magical portals that link the worlds together, along with the laws inside them, Soli must work through each of the dangerous worlds, each full of unique properties, whilst saving the mages within them before the worlds collapse. It’s not all that original these days to have a tale of a majestic hero who must save the world, however, it’s always one we can get behind as an audience and with Soli providing the only thing against destruction, he quickly becomes a lovable hero.

The gameplay itself follows a mostly linear path with very little backtracking and only a minor amount of exploration beyond the well-beaten path, however, that isn’t something we should look upon as a negative as with the game world proving extensively large, it’s a nice and welcome change to not finding ourselves continually going backwards to find new areas or open a new door, and instead, it allows for the platforming to take centre stage which is certainly the case here.

Throughout the game, players’ platforming and reflex skills are put to the test frequently with portals often used to swap between the different dimensions in order to create new platforms or even swap enemies and other hazards into useable and non-hostile items that can be used to progress to the next area. Some portals also allow the player to turn things into stone or slow time or even swap gravity and find hidden paths.  Again this isn’t a new feature and is something we’ve seen before on Xbox in Giana Sisters: Twisted Dreams, however within this game, players won’t find themselves switching between multiple locations at once but will find the different locations appearing within each portal around specific areas or around the protagonist Soli when activated.

Rather than offering up multiple mechanics at once, players are restricted to a connection with just one world at a time through progression past specific gates, and whilst this sounds a little counterproductive as it limits the mechanics in use, with one new mechanic per world, it’s actually a great way of retaining a fresh feel to the gameplay without overwhelming the player with multiple abilities all at once.

Of course like many other games in the genre, Unbound: Worlds Apart retains a heavy focus on puzzles from start to finish and to progress through these you will need to use the portals and whatever your current mechanic at the time is for almost all of them, with very few able to be mastered without doing so. Of course, these individual mechanics alone won’t be enough with players also required to make the most of the classic platform abilities available to Soli such as wall climbing, double-jump and dash all making appearances as key mechanics within the game.

Away from the gameplay and I can’t say enough just how pleasing the visual side of things are with stunning hand-painted backdrops and a host of incredible looking enemies that really grab the attention from the moment they enter the screen. This is helped of course by the fantastically vibrant visuals and attention to detail with enemies and characters as well as each of the many environments seen in the game.

Making this even more impressive is the fact that you can switch the environment at the press of a button courtesy of the previously mentioned portals and at no point do the visuals ever falter, with incredible detail and smooth transitions every time you alter any given area.

On top of the visuals is of course the incredible sound design with a soundtrack that really pulls the atmosphere and tension together whilst matching the environments perfectly with some quality sound effects for the things such as enemy movement or the thud of your protagonist’s body weight as you hit a platform.

Conclusion

Overall, in terms of a fully polished gaming experience, Unbound: Worlds Apart is certainly up there amongst the defining titles in the genre which can offer the complete experience. Sure, some may find certain parts of the game a little more challenging than expected, however at no point does the game ever feel unfair or unmanageable and I’d certainly recommend seeing this indie gem through to the end.

This game was reviewed based on Xbox One review code, using an Xbox Series S|X console. All of the opinions and insights here are subject to that version. Game provided by publisher.

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