Thoughts on Aether

I really liked this game. It’s a short little flash game where you pilot some sort of creature by using it’s tongue to swinging from clouds and asteroids to several different planets where you have to solve a puzzle that makes each planet happy. Or something like that. It has cute but sort of creepy art by Edmund McMillen who also also lent his style to the game Gish. The art is quite pretty, but I was most impressed by the gameplay.

I really liked the way the gravity felt in this game. As you swing your little guy higher and higher into the atomosphere of each planet the gravity decreases until eventually you are just floating at the angle and velocity of your choice. Although meneuvering was at times difficult, The swinging mechanics were pretty fun and I never felt frustrated. In fact the game was actually pretty relaxing, aside from the depressing mood the game sets up through speech bubbles over the little creatures in the world and the music. I felt like those two elements alone were enough to transmit the message this game was trying to send, and my only real complaint is that the poems at the beginning and end were a bit cheesy and (in my opinion) unnecessary. Overall though, it’s a cool little game, and since it’s a free flash game there is no reason not to check it out.