In 2023, we got three indie games inspired by the N64 era 3D platformers that released exclusively on PC: Pseudoregalia, Corn Kidz 64, and Cavern Of Dreams. As you'd expect, I wasn't able to play any of them last year, which is why I was very pleasantly surprised to learn that Cavern Of Dreams was getting a Switch port on Feb 29th. Now that I've finally gotten my hands on it, I'm pleased to say that it's a very great time.
Cavern Of Dreams has a classic collectathon premise where you play as a dragon named Fynn as he explores the titular cavern to find all of his lost siblings (most of whom haven't hatched yet). You may think this sounds a lot like Spyro 3, but trust me, Fynn plays completely differently. Fynn's moveset is very fun and has a surprising amount of depth. When you start the game, you can jump, roll around, and, soon enough, tail swipe to hit switches. If you jump right before you hit the ground, you can do a double jump, and if you do a tail swipe right before you hit the ground, you can bounce forward. You can also gain momentum by rolling down hills, enter a dash by curling out of your roll while at top speed, and do a long jump by jumping out of your roll. All of these moves transition into each other really nicely, and the fact that Cavern Of Dreams gives you this many options from the get-go is great. I've already been able to pull off some skips, and I think there's a decent amount of sequence breaking potential here.
As you go through the game, you'll unlock some more fun moves like a glide and a horn stomp (basically a ground pound) that increases your range of movement even further. You can jump out of your horn stomp to gain even more height if the double jump isn't good enough, and curl from a glide into a roll to keep your momentum going. One of my favorite things about gaining moves is how backtracking is treated as almost like a difficulty slider. A no-backtracking run is absolutely possible, you can get every collectible in a level in a single go... but it's going to be tough. The first level, for example, has a bunch of collectibles hidden behind tight platforming segments that would be made much easier with the glide. If you want to challenge yourself, you can do all of this without the glide, and if you're struggling, you can wait to get some more moves. My favorite instance of this is in Airborne Armada where you stumble across an Egg being set on fire. You can put out the fire with a bubble move you get way later, or you can find a potion in a far-away spot of the map, carry it all the way to the egg, and put out the fire with that.
Speaking of which, let's talk about the actual exploration. Cavern Of Dreams isn't super long with a hub and four main levels, but the levels themselves are quite large and contain a ton of collectibles. There's that Banjo Kazooie style of progression where the first level is somewhat contained and easy to navigate, but the later stages get increasingly more complex and large, requiring a bit more spatial reasoning to get around. For example, Airborne Armada takes place on a giant aircraft you can lean left and right, and Prismatic Palace has you find a bunch of fake eggs before you can access the entire bottom half of the stage. If I had to compare Cavern Of Dreams to any actual N64 platformer in terms of progression, I'd say it feels like Rocket: Robot On Wheels but with an interconnected map similar to Banjo-Tooie. Like in Rocket, each level is filled to the brim with secret areas and mini-challenges to get Eggs, with the hub in particularly being absolutely sprawling with different rooms and shortcuts between the levels. It feels like the game is always throwing neat new ideas at you which makes me want to explore all the more. The collectibles are also all pretty reasonable to get. Aside from the usual eggs, there's a bunch of collectible cards which are usually hidden in even harder-to-spot placed than the eggs, along with the note-equivalent mushrooms which are peppered throughout the stage but usually well-placed enough that you're never going to be aimlessly wandering around trying to find that last mushroom. With fun and varied objectives and an enjoyable moveset, simply exploring in Cavern Of Dreams is super engaging.
However, like many a Nintendo 64 collectathon, man does this game have some tough objectives. Cavern Of Dreams is very puzzle-heavy and there's a whole bunch of puzzles that left me stumped for a bit. For some of these puzzles, I even had to look them up, with a notable one involving you taking a shortcut into another level, finding an item, and bringing it back with you. How was I supposed to know you could even do that?! And while I did praise this game's sequence break potential, it can be a bit of a double-edged sword. Cavern Of Dreams has a lot of missions that are made easier by doing other missions. So for example, there's a bit in Prismatic Palace where you need to do incredibly tight platforming past a bunch of laser sentries, which you can make easier by turning off the sentries. However, if you're like me and had no idea you could turn off the sentries, then you could waste dozens of attempts trying to beat this room with the sentries on making things unnecessarily harder for yourself. This happened to me a bunch throughout the game, where I had no idea I was accidentally doing a sequence break which led to completely preventable frustration. Ultimately, I think this game just needs a bit more signposting overall.
The visual presentation is where Cavern Of Dreams shines the absolute brightest. There are a lot of games that have tried to capture the N64 aesthetic. Hell, I've even talked about one just this year. However, I don't think any game nails the vibe just as well as Cavern Of Dreams. This game looks so spot-on, from the large spaces, to the stretched-out textures, to the eerie liminal hallways, to the pastel color palette akin to later N64 games like Kirby 64. There's such a hazy and dreamy quality to it, and while Super Kiwi 64 delves more into blatant horror, I think Cavern Of Dreams did a better job of capturing that unintentionally creepy quality that N64 games can have. I also like how Cavern Of Dreams adds some minor embellishments to line itself up with modern standards a bit, like some beautiful dynamic lighting, particle effects, and charming animations for Fynn. On the other hand, the music is probably one of the game's weaker aspects for me. Cavern Of Dreams's soundtrack goes for a spacey ambient feel not too dissimilar from the hub themes from Ripto's Rage. It's certainly pleasant to listen to but it didn't really stick with me much.
Overall, Cavern Of Dreams was a really charming N64 style platformer that so effortlessly recreated the appeal of its inspirations, with beautifully nostalgic visuals, fluid controls, and engaging if obtuse exploration. It didn't take too long for me to finish, but Cavern Of Dreams was a joy the whole way through.
4/5 Stats
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