Animal Well
WHERE TO PLAY
Animal Well is sure to be one of 2024’s surprise hits. It’s Metroidvania gameplay plays second fiddle to a seemingly endless mystery. Reviewed on PC.
This is my second attempt at writing myAnimal Wellreview. While my first draft was positive about the game, it did it a disservice, so I deleted it all. It’s a game split into multiple parts, the first of which is fun, and the remaining parts of which are likely to simultaneously make you feel like a genius, cause you to despair, and blow your mind.
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But, taking it back a step and providing some context, the humble Metroidvania is one of my favorite genres to dabble in. I recently loosely compiled my personal top 100 games of all time, and a few from the genre sit pretty.Hollow Knightis just outside the top 10, andMetroid Dreadand Super Metroid are comfortably in the top 50. There’s something about the atmosphere that the genre manages to convey and its ability to tell a story through its world that brings me back time after time. So, when the opportunity to review Animal Well, the first game fromDunkey’spublishing label BigMode, arose, I jumped.
My review is intentionally vague, as I’ve tried to keep it as spoiler-free as possible. It’s better that way, trust me.
The Opening Hours
As I alluded to, Animal Well’s first portion is solid Metroidvania comfort food.
Set in well… a well, the game’s sullen atmosphere shines, one of the first things I look for when I pick up anyMetroidvania. Devoid of any natural light, the world is lit only by mysterious underground structures, flora, and fauna. The only sounds come from those same structures or the occasional animal, with a background synth swelling when danger is near.
The game’s sullen atmosphere shines.
While parts of it feel familiar, Animal Well takes a slightly different approach to the standard Metroidvania formula. Early on, there’s a big emphasis on puzzle-solving and puzzle-platforming, a theme that exponentially evolves as the game unfolds. Not only is progress hindered by the items in your inventory, but a keen eye and sharp mind are also required to move forward. That’s not to say that the typical Metroidvania elements are unimportant, just don’t expect to be able to hop, skip and jump around the map to complete the game.
Combat is also invariably different. Dangerous enemies and bosses are presented as puzzles, with spear and shield-wielding dogs requiring clever tact and guile to slip past and key bosses not defeated in battle, but instead, by being outwitted in a larger puzzle. This approach to design both pushed me away from Animal Well, while also pulling me in further. I don’t typically play puzzle games, nowPicrossis my jam, but ultimately, I tend to find the experience more frustrating than enjoyable. This feels different though, and I think community collaboration will only help to drive the game forward, but more on that later.
A keen eye and sharp mind are required to move forward.
Initially, what stopped me from playing further into the game was some slightly awkward checkpointing, some awkwardness traversing the map, and what I perceived to be huge difficulty spikes with one or two of the bosses. It turns out I was playing it wrong.
Much More Than A Metroidvania
My first review of Animal Well was written after I played around 9-10 hours of the game and rolled credits; however, after some truly intriguing chatter among my games media compatriots in an Animal Well review Discord server, I decided to dive back in. I’m now at around 30 hours. I made the right choice.
The first portion of the game serves as a Metroidvania, but after rolling the first set of credits, Animal Well really comes into its own. New items become available, each fundamentally changing the game, and new, previously inaccessible areas open up, transforming the game into a unique, mystery-filled puzzler. There were certainly things that piqued my interest during the opening hours; however, the further I got, the more I noticed and the deeper the game’s secrets became.
It’s a masterclass in puzzle design.
As I touched on earlier, Animal Well will really shine with a strong community at its heart. The puzzles are never obtuse or unfair (although they are very difficult at times); however, the grand scale of the game means what may seem like the most minor of details could actually be key and is, therefore, likely to be overlooked by most. Despite ~40 journalists and creators having the game early, collaborating on various aspects and putting in hundreds of combined hours, it feels like we’ve barely scratched the surface of what Animal Well is hiding. As a group, there were more than a few “holy shit” moments, and there are undoubtedly dozens more hiding in a game that had me doing things no other has before.
Animal Well is a game that’s clearly been built with passion. It’s a masterclass in puzzle design, with tight platforming, set in a beautiful, oftentimes perilous world. It’s actually at its weakest when it’s just a Metroidvania, and instead, its world and the genre serve as a way to deliver some of the most intricate, interconnected puzzles of any game I’ve ever played. Steeped in mystery, Animal Well is a title I can’t help but recommend, and one you should go into as spoiler-free as possible. It has the potential to be this year’s Inscryption.
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