36 Fragments of Midnight Review

36 Fragments of Midnight

Release: September 14, 2017
Publisher: Ratalaika Games
Developer: Ratalaika Games
Genre: Indie, Platformer, Puzzle, Switch Reviews
PEGI: E
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Indie developers are already bringing a wide range of their titles to the Nintendo Switch eshop. We have platformers, action games, puzzle games, and more! 36 Fragments of Midnight adds to that collection of games by bringing a simple, low budget puzzle-platformer to the Switch. But I think the Wii U and 3DS eshops have proven that not all low budget games are worth the cheap price of entry. Should you spend your money on 36 Fragments of Midnight or save it?

36 Fragments of Midnight has no story and its introduction is pretty simple. A bit of text comes up and tells you what the goal of the game is and what the controls are. Then you go around and try to collect the 36 Fragments. This may seem like an easy challenge, but this game is definitly not easy.

Buzz saws, spikes, and laser beams will get in the player’s way when they are trying to collect the 36 Fragments. You will die a lot in this game. And each time, the level changes and so you’ll have to adapt to the changes instead of memorizing how to get past them. I hesitate to say that this game has “randomly generated levels” though.

The challenges and the placement of them do get repeated a lot. Even so, its tricky to remember where everything is when everything switches around after you die. 36 Fragments will keep track of your high score (the highest number of fragments you collected). So you will know if you are making any progress toward getting all of the fragments or not. Thankfully, 36 Fragments is a game of skill and not a game of struggling with awful controls.

36 Fragments is all about timing. So if the controls in this game sucked, than you could blame your bad timing on that. Unfortunely for you, the controls in this game are excellent. Moving around with the analog stick works well and the jump/double jump works perfectly. I do wish this game had used some other Switch features like the touch screen or motion controls though. Oh well. The game does what it needs to and its a pretty neat little game for the price you pay for it.

I usually don’t bring up a game’s price but I feel that the price is important for this game. 36 Fragments of Midnight costs $2.99 on the Nintendo Switch eshop. Thats a very low price and the game is worth that price. I’m not saying that 36 Fragments of Midnight is a great game, its no, but for the price you pay, it is a fun little puzzle platformer. And it has nice graphics too!

36 Fragments has very nice graphics. The main character and general level design are simple, yet the shadowy look of levels and low lighting make 36 Fragments graphics’ pop. This game is nowhere near the best looking game on Switch, however its not the worst looking either. It does look good on both the Switch’s screen and the TV screen.

There is no soundtrack to this game though. The “music” in this game is a sort of howling, like the wind I suppose. It can be a little annoying but the game definitely could’ve had a worst “soundtrack”. This game’s sound effects are not that good either. There is only a little musical sound when you die. There is no sound effect for jumping or when you hit saw blades or laser beams. That said, 36 Fragments of Midnight is a good game, especially when you consider the game’s price!

36 Fragments of Midnight would never win best game on the Nintendo Switch, but it couldn’t be claimed as the worst game on the system either. The game’s concept is pretty simple and yet the gameplay can be fun and its definitely challenging too. Also, the game’s low price is a good incentive for downloading it. If you want a simple puzzle platformer to play for a few mintues, this game would be easy to recommend.

Sure not everything about this game is perfect. 36 Fragments of Midnight doesn’t have a soundtrack and the concept may just be too simple for some people. If you can past its faults, you might want to look into 36 Fragments of Midnight!

Thanks Ratalaika Games for providing a review copy of this game. 36 Fragments of Midnight is out now for the Nintendo Switch eshop!

Positives

• Really good graphics
• Excellent controls
• Low price

Negatives

• Simpleconcept
• Sound could be better

Trailer