Echoplex: The Puzzler Where Your Past Self Gives Chase
Doubletake
Your Portals and Antichambers and Turing Tests may have sated your desire for first-person puzzlers. But if you want to traipse through more rooms full of confusing buttons and sliding doorways while being observed by something mildly sinister, then here’s something. Echoplex sees you navigating its puzzley world while being pursued by a shadow of your former self. Walked down this hallway? See your echo pass by moments later. Pressed some buttons a few seconds ago? The echo will eventually push them too, undoing the effect. And if your echo catches you, it’s dying time. Come see how creepy this can be in the trailer below.
You need to use careful timing to take advantage of your past self and to escape the titular echoplex. It's still in Greenlight at the moment, that warren of garish pixel art and bad drawings, but hoping to escape soon. In the meantime, there’s a five-level demo available for those who want to dive right into some time-shadow creepiness.
If this mechanic feels familiar it’s because Cursor*10 did something similar with mouse cursors, forcing you to work with multiple clickers all made by your previous actions. There’s also a bit in The Talos Principle where you have to clone yourself as a recording to carry out steps in a larger puzzle, and of course everyone remembers Braid. This is a little different to those, since none of your clones threatened to follow you about like a malevolent shade and kill you when they caught up.
Thanks to indiegames.com for pointing this one out.