A Sleeper's Quest: A Labyrinth to Thee

tl;dr: The game is challenging, but in a way that feels like you can overcome it and want to feel rewarded for doing such a thing. I haven't played a game like it before, but it feels like Super Meat Boy meets Gone Home but with hints and flavor from Dark Souls. It's theme is dreams and it nails that, even if you don't realize it at the moment. To beat this game feels like a great accomplishment that most games of today don't give you the opportunity to feel. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- There might be a game out there that you can compare this too, but I haven't played it. I felt like I was playing Celeste or Super Meat Boy meets Gone Home. The platforming was solid, and the only time I really felt punished by it was out of complacency or doing something that might not have been intended cause it would've been a cool jump. Gone Home just feels like the most comparable First Person puzzle-esque game that I can think of. So add some platforming to it and bam. Maybe it's because I've been playing soulslike games lately, but strangely I also felt reminded of Dark Souls while playing this. I'd often be lost and confused, stumbling between not knowing what to do and hoping that I'd find my way to something that would give me new hope. Finding that new path, felt like a new bonfire and the checkpoint systems were very similar. Finding a new chest was like finding a key to a door you haven't unlocked yet. Every new platforming puzzle felt like a new boss. I was about half way through when I start to feel like I'd never find my way out, but it didn't feel like fatigue. It felt like frustration. Like when a boss tests your ego and pride in Dark Souls. You don't want to give up. You can't stop till you win. You can't be defeated by this video game. I wouldn't say that A Sleeper's Quest has a story, as much as it has a theme and nails it. I didn't realize it at first, but after I was scared by a number of my abrupt deaths I realized that it was similar to a flinch dream. Like in inception, when they need to be jolted awake. The game can feel hard to navigate at times, I even had a moment where I just kept walking between the same dead ends, but then everything started to feel like I was just subconsciously finding my way around. I remember saying "I couldn't give someone directions on how to get to where I wanted to go, but subconsciously I know almost exactly where I'm going." There's something about that subconscious knowledge that also feels like it empowers the dream theme. The general ambiance is also obscured in a way that reminds me of trying to remember a dream that wasn't super vivid, but memorable. It's surrounded with fog and there are enough moments that you get a sense of familiarity and can remember certain parts, but then there's just like obscure corridors that are engulfed in fog that just felt reminiscent of the parts you can't remember or when bits of a dream are similar to another. The music was also the perfect backdrop. When you're paying attention to it, it has an air of mystery but also adds a level of tension seemingly creepy-ish, but it also feels like great puzzle music. Then after you listen to it for long enough, it just kind of fades into the background. It becomes white noise that you're not registering, until you pay attention again and still just appreciate the ambiance it brings about the game. I don't know what I expected going into A Sleeper's Quest but I'm really glad that I did. I just.... I feel really accomplished after beating it, in a way that most games don't really leave you feeling nowadays.

Hard to recommend. It might just be my tastes, but as nice as the game's environment looks, Sleeper's Quest is as basic as possible, with nothing interesting going on. It's essentially a single playground/maze with no points of interest, incentives or gimmicks. Is the game challenging, yes, but it's basic platforming as the description puts it; WASD movement with space to jump, shift to sprint, and on occasion, jump pads.

You suddenly wake up. Come back, Sleeper. Close your eyes...