Freeware Garden: Yet, I despise him
If you'd be so kind as to ignore the irritating prompt to log into GameJolt, you'll be pleasantly surprised by Yet, I despise him. It's a platformer with a protagonist dressed to please Lovecraft - despite carrying a shotgun - with tight controls, smartly designed levels and carefully smoothed difficulty curve.
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Yet, I despise him is a game that really gets its blend of difficulty and variety just right. It hits the difficulty sweet spot. It's never easy, never boring and never, ever frustrating and I had to admire just how perfectly its keyboard-only controls worked. I actually managed to pull off a rather intimidating series of wall jumps, followed by a double jump and taking a well timed shot in my first go and I'm definitely not the most dexterous of people. I never really managed to go anywhere with Super Meat Boy, for example, and quickly abandoned it, but this, well, this I loved.
I loved the way it taxed my timing and reflexes, loved how it was broken down into manageable chunks, loved its looks, loved its level design and even appreciated the subtle and unobtrusive way it handled its simple yet interesting plot.
Yet, I despise him casts you as Richard, a hero with obvious daddy issues in a quest to find whatever happened to his explorer dad somewhere within the uncharted wilderness. On your journey you will probably come to terms with your deep resentment for your father, but, more intriguingly, discover that his lack of presence had some pretty occult and dangerous reasons behind it. Reasons involving quite a few unspeakable things and weird monstrosities.
To find out the truth you'll have to travel through three vividly different levels, all sporting lovely graphics of a hand-drawn quality, collecting orbs that will allow you to, uhm, do something I won't spoil. Just keep in mind that after you beat the Aztec, fungus forest and frozen sea wasteland levels, there's more.