PAX East 2019: Necrosphere Brings Fun And Frustration

Another title I anticipated to check out at PAX East this year was 8-bit platformer Necrosphere from South Brazil developer Cat Nigiri. Following the death of Agent Terry Cooper, he finds himself in the afterlife and must run his way through the underworld back to the real world.

Agent Cooper’s cause of death was sourced from a headshot wound during a secret mission with two other colleagues accompanying him on the expedition. After the other agents left Terry behind, the guilt caught up with them and turned to the advanced technology of their agency to contact Agent Cooper. Leaving notes throughout the course of the game as tutorials for the player.

At the studio’s booth on the show floor, I spoke with the game’s level designer Caio Lopez and discussed with him on the difficulty of Necrosphere and the choice to keep players on their toes with each segment of the game. Lopez stating the inspiration for Necrosphere spawned from the 2D platformer vvvvvv, intending for the player to die a lot. But rather than making the player mad, he wants players to be annoyed rather than aggravating for them.

Lopez expanding on the concept of players facing over difficult levels, he states:

I want players to think when they play the game [Necrosphere]: to see what they are trying to do and view the challenge ahead of them as practical or truly impossible.

Discussing that users should see all options that are accessible and to try all possibilities that are available to overcome the obstacle. Difficulty also shows to be what fans enjoy the most when playing the game, especially at events like the Penny Arcade Expo Cat Nigiri Designer Marcello Lima added.

Expanding on consumer input, I asked how the game has been received since the game is already out on most major platforms. Where both explained that players on the Steam platform reviewed the game well compared to its console counterparts: specifically PlayStation 4 as the game is currently not out on Xbox One, but Cat Nigiri is planning to expand to Microsoft’s console in the coming months. But for Nintendo Switch, it seems that the platform’s reception seems to even out similarly to PC.

The developers shared that the introduction of the game’s Deluxe Edition of Necrosphere opened the door for the title to expand to other platforms. The newer iteration on top of offering an additional mission, ‘Terry’s Dream’, the game also launched on PlayStation 4 and Nintendo Switch after the game’s debut on PC.

Seeing how fast you can play through the game, I asked if there were any chance of a speedrun mode that will be patched into the game in a future client update, but Lopez explained that there isn’t any added mode that can track players time throughout the length of the game. Regardless of that, players have still chose to speedrun the game anyway and one even finishing the title in just 18 minutes roughly.

Necrosphere is currently out for PC, Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4, and PlayStation Vita.