Ethan: Meteor Hunter is a side scrolling hair pulling Puzzler with many deaths and a lot of trial and error. Struck upon the head by a piece of falling Meteor, hairy rodent Ethan is granted powers that you will need to master to get through 3 worlds and 50 levels. The opening Comic book style animation is all you get in terms of the story, and the game focuses more on gameplay and attempting to be one of the hardest puzzlers out there.

Most of the puzzles involve you pausing time and moving blocks around to aid Ethan to whatever goal he is trying to attempt at the time, whether it be pushing a button or simply progressing to a higher location. There are moments here where you feel like you completed the puzzle in a way the developer probably didn’t think of which brings a certain level of “wow that just happened” moments. Sadly these moments are after trying to move the blocks into the specific spot where the game actually allows you to place them. This mechanic is such a headache at times and as it is the main focus of puzzle solving, so player beware. the game is NOT easy, and it reminded me of Funky Lab Rat, which EdEN reviewed for the site.

Mixing the puzzle elements in with flawless platforming made for one of the hardest plat-formers I can think of as of late. I never imagined a sawmill would be so dangerous. Within the first 2 hours, I must have died a good thirty times. Execution needs to be flawless and thinking ahead is a must. There are often times where you are sliding down a slope and have to jump and pause time in mid air to move blocks into place to assure Ethan’s safe landing on anything but a lava type substance. You may need to keep the momentum going with a pause and jump to pause again. Most of this result in death for the first few attempts, making it a true “trial and error experience” from start to finish.

Luckily the checkpoint system is somewhat clever with a well placed meteorite chunk before each puzzle that allows you to hold the O button and re-spawn right before the current puzzle. This is great early on, but the later puzzles become rather long and having to replay some minutes at a time did get to me at some points.

Pogo sections were also a bit out there. Jumping on shattering platforms and climbing upward only to miss one jump and having to do the entire session again became frustrating. Boss battles are no different. We are talking about long flawless battles where one mistake sends you back to the beginning of the battle again.

Ethan: Meteor Hunter has 50 levels to test your skill, with an artstyle is constant during the whole game, which can be a blessing or a curse. I wish they would have added some more color and separation between worlds to give the game a different feel. If you like hard games with a challenge with a “trial and error” heavy mechanic, then Ethan: Meteor Hunter is what you need.

[review pros=”

Challenging

Unique

” cons=”Heartless

Superhuman Trophies
” score=70]