[Using the same emotional reaction as the reveal in The Crying Game] This Is No Cave! Indeed, it’s not. It’s a gravity-defying runner set in the murky depths of darkestville, as you run, jump, and swing your way through a hazardous cavern in the hope of ‘doing it well’.
Doing it well can be measured with a wristwatch, egg timer, or the built-in timer. Can you beat strangers by storming through each stage, collecting all the gems, and coming out all rosy? You can certainly earn some bragging rights, but for the best times, you either need to be super AI or have a cheat code.
When exploring said cave(s), there’s nobody around to tell you what to do, or any representatives from the parkour compliance board ensuring you’re following the guidelines. At the start of This Is No Cave, a game by Monome Studio, it’s recommended to play with a mouse. In fear of pretending to be the rebel that I most certainly am not, I played exclusively on the Steam Deck.
The Steam Deck can be hit or miss with a handful of games, irrespective of the technical restrictions, but from the perspective of using sticks? They’re absolutely fine. However, rules/guidelines are there to make your life easier and more efficient (in theory), and playing with a mouse definitely gives you the edge.
So, what’s with the control system? Your little jumpy adventurer likes to run. They aren’t particularly fast, which is sometimes good, but they’re operating mostly on freewill, so you have to click that out of them by moving an ever-present cursor to direct where to jump to.
Like Jet Set Willy with finesse, a jetpack kicks in that allows your explorer to shoot up to greater heights or descend further into the abyss. These little thrusts are restricted, so repeated use will deplete the tanks and guarantee a collision or two with the terrain, or later… enemies.
This Is No Cave flows at a leisurely pace, and to begin with, I was taking my time to explore the areas. That’s not to say you’ll experience some gorgeous vistas, unless you like a colour palette of black, and instead, on a sidequest to locate the collectable gems for 100% completion. If you’ll remember, the goal is to complete in the fastest time possible, though my motivation was to unlock everything, then perfect my times.
Unfortunately, my motivation took a dip when viewing the scoreboards. Having access to a review title before release is fun when you’re almost guaranteed to see your name on the scoreboard, and accepting that it’ll drop when the real players commence. That said, I still have a few number one spots on the globals for some shmups, thank you very much. That dip was the comparison to times.
Sure, I was in the top ten – again, not a personal motivation as I was taking a bit more time to collect gems, but when I sped up, I’d see the top score would be 7 seconds when mine was, at first, shy of a minute. Alas, my cynicism kicked in to thinking one cannot get through the level in 7 seconds, surely? Perhaps a future playthrough will convince me otherwise. It definitely changed my view, and I ended up abandoning the gems in favour of getting better times.
This is when This Is No Cave increases the challenge in that you can now fire an extendable rope to attach to designated objects that allow you to swing around tight bends. It’s quite a natural mechanic that makes sense, like the platform game Grapple Dog, and a little tweaking to get used to. The ante is further upped when you can then direct your swing with the second stick (on the Steam Deck) and propel further forward, increasing the speed even more.
Undoubtedly, this makes the game even more difficult but more so enticing as you start to build up a decent tempo, after a fair share of Souls-like deaths, until you get it right. Super Meat Boy-like boss chases further add to the urgency, and, of course, those comparable leaderboards will encourage you further.
Besides that, This Is No Cave is not exclusively set in the dark, and the scenery will change. Not that you’ll have much time to reflect. An endless mode also brings in the speedrunner crowds, and something I didn’t test due to my friend groups ‘growing out of video games in their 20s – b-o-r-i-n-g – you can have a 4-player co-op/PVP. For parkour fans who don’t have to think about the old Bill or Johnny Public getting in the way, come run through this playground. It certainly ain’t no cave I ever seen.
