I had a little time this week to talk about a game and I hurried to my computer and typed up something as fast as possible. I missed this week’s game during Nextfest but the demo was still up even though Nextfest was over with. I really appreciate developers that leave their demos up, because not everyone can get to every demo.

This week is a dope 3D platformer about harnessing the power of copy & paste. This week is Ruffy and the Riverside.

Ruffy and the Riverside is a 3D platformer from Zockrates Laboratories UG and Phiphen Games. The game is slated to release sometime in the future for all modern consoles and the PC.

The player takes on the role of Ruffy, an adorable, little, hairy creature, as they embark on an adventure to stop the big, bad guy from destroying the world. Ruffy is accompanied by a “sassy” bee friend and a mole man with a blue hat as they platform their way through colorful and exotic locales. The open world is fun to navigate and there is always something to do if you don’t want to dedicate to a full-on level section.

Ruffy is a pretty standard 3D platformer. You’ll be jumping around a lot, doing side quests for the various inhabitants of Riverside and in return, the citizens will give you stars. Stars allow Ruffy to access different areas like Mario 64 and the like. Once you get enough stars then you can move on to the next area filled with loads of platforming and puzzles to solve.

The gimmick here is that Ruffy is the chosen one, so they can swap the environment around to make inaccessible locations accessible. The ability makes the world feel more magical as Ruffy swaps climbable grass onto rushing water to create a pseudo-bridge to cross or turn the water into lava to break boxes.

There is a good feeling that my brain gets when I solve one of Ruffy’s puzzles.

The hand-drawn visuals and animations are something to behold in Ruffy and the Riverside. The game is absolutely gorgeous; to the point that I stood around in the worlds to just take in all of the visuals and Ruffy’s idle animation which I find adorable.

The audio is pretty standard as NPC’s don’t have voices just little quirky sounds, and the world’s music is on theme with whatever world you are in. In a tropical land? Very exotic sounding track. The very first level you go into has a really good song on a loop that I never really wanted to leave.

Ruffy and the Riverside’s demo really took me back. I always enjoy platformers but this demo was so fun that I could have played for even longer and I eventually had to pry myself away from the computer to play a full game for the week. Great demo that really showcases how well the game is going to turn out.