Developer: Brightside Games
Publisher: Brightside Games
Platforms: PC
Team Indie – Review
Team Indie combines some of our favorite indie characters in one action-packed platform game with a unique feature – playing co-op with your prior runs while bending time to complete puzzles and safely finish levels.
Story
Marvin the cat from Team Indie has gotten himself into a bit of trouble. Oskar, another cat has managed to rid Marvin of his necklace and this ordeal has caused Marvin to get trapped in the video game world. Since Marvin isn’t quipped with various skills needed to finish the complex levels of the game, his owner decides to hack his favorite indie characters into the game. Marvin will then be able to play co-op games with these individuals by running through their previous runs so that he may pass the levels safe and sound. While the storyline in Team Indie is rather simple, it does explain everything that is going on. It truly doesn’t need anything less nor more than what it is.
Graphics
While the visual design is somewhat cartoony, it doesn’t over-do the cartoon style in general. The various levels in the worlds are carefully designed and each material is easy recognizable which is a must in a puzzle platform game. Because Marvin the cat is in some way adorable, as are the other characters, Team Indie is a perfect family game although it does have a steep learning curve to it. The lack of blood and gore may put some hardcore players off but those that name themselves hardcore should remember that the level designs are in no way truly linear and require many mechanics to complete.
Sound
The sound in Team Indie is less subtle than you’d want, although it does remind me of the awesome tunes of the early Mario games – classic platforming tunes. Every little action that you perform, from picking up gems to sliding with CommanderVideo to bombing crates with Clunk, has their own very distinct sound – a pleasant feature.
Gameplay
Since Team Indie is a platform game there is no need for a mouse. Personally I am very fond of the controller since the mapping is so simple and easy to learn but one can also play with the keyboard if they prefer. All-in-all, there are only five buttons to ‘learn’ which means the player can focus on completing the levels rather than having a fight with the controls. Most of the actions you can perform are quite easy to do, however I did notice a certain on-going issue with Dustgirl where I was unable to steer her up a wall with the controller while it worked flawlessly with the keyboard.
As mentioned before, in order to save Marvin the cat you will need to play co-op games with several characters from rather well-known indie games. Each of these characters have one of their original skills and can help Marvin complete a level with their abilities. Once in a while, you’ll need to complete a level with two of more of these characters, making the levels even more complex than they already are. In total, the player will meet nine indie characters: CommanderVideo from BIT.TRIP Presents Runner 2, Clunk from Awesomenauts, Super Crate Box guy from Super Crate Box, Black Fluff Ball from Badland, Tiny from Tiny & Big: Grandpa’s Leftovers, Mi from Knytt Underground, J. Jitters from The Great Jitters: Pudding Panic, Dustgirl from Dustforce and lastly Tim from Braid. Being able to play these indie game characters in a different setting than their own is a true blast but luckily the characters are not the biggest feature in the game since they can easily be replaced with unknown characters – keeping the gameplay intact.
For the majority of time you will be playing as Marvin but often enough, you’ll gain control of any of the characters mentioned above. Once in control of a new character, you must figure out how to complete the puzzle. This is mostly easy since you’d need to follow the blue gems but some puzzles are more difficult to complete – especially if you need to perform a speed run with several characters that each have to do something completely different. Since each character has two abilities, there is a large variation of mechanics but this also ups the learning curve of the game as you’d need to remember them all. Once you have completed the puzzle, you’ll regain control of Marvin, who then needs to go through his own set of puzzles and action sequences during the same timeframe as the other characters – thus playing co-op with your own prior runs. If you’ve performed your previous run somewhat slowly, you can always bend time and fast-forward so that you can continue with Marvin as fast as possible.
Since there are three worlds to venture in, there are over fifty levels to complete and three boss-fights where you are up against Oskar – the evil cat who has sent Marvin on his merry way in the video game world. During these boss-fights, you will need to use the mechanics you’ve learned the levels before – thus making the regular levels great training grounds for your skills.
Each character has their own house of medals so you can view which medals you have and which ones you are missing. These medals are also achievements in Steam which ups the replayability of the game since you’d want to go back through a level where you have missed a certain medal. However since this is truly the only reason why you’d want to replay the levels, the replayability factor remains low.
Conclusion
The game uses a large variation of mechanics to complete the puzzles which does up the overall fun-factor of it, however some mechanics have a steeper learning curve to them than others – making the game a perfect test-factory for your patience. The visual and auditory design are well balanced. That in combination with the clever level designs makes the game feels carefully crafted which makes it an overall joy to play.
Team Indie - Review,
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