Now here’s a game that’s a riddle, wrapped in a mystery, inside an enigma*. “Flycatcher” initially seems like a terrible platformer… but then you discover its core game mechanic, and suddenly it’s *awesome*.
The game has a walking and jumping model so poor, you’d think the game was broken. But then you start spinning webs, swinging from platform to platform, collecting flies, and flying through the air with the greatest of ease, and you start to suspect the walking and jumping was left deliberately slow and understated just so the swinging would be that much more epic.
Swinging is a mechanic that’s been used in games at least as far back as “Pitfall!” on the Atari 2600 (et al). (Wait… did Pitfall have an exclamation point? Now I’m doubting myself…) But this is the freestyle version, with multiple routes to your various goals, and some interesting wrinkles such as one level where you have to stay within a rectangle of death as it floats across the levels (as one example). Easily worth $1 (or thereabouts) if you’re a fan of Pitfall!, classic Spiderman games, etc., or if you’re interesting in trying a swinging-specific game.
Here’s what the developer (Stockton) has to say about the game:
“Web swinging spider fun. Swing through the trees to catch flies, beetles and more. Avoid dangers such as gas attacks and hornets. Includes local leaderboards.”
* Lots of people know this quote, but fewer know who said it, or about what; it was Winston Churchill, and he was speaking about Russia.
Writings of Mass Deduction 