Another Sight

Although we haven't seen a proper Alice in Wonderland game in some time now, Lewis Carroll's popular books series looms large over the industry. Where would we be without games that tossed seemingly normal youngsters into surreal adventures filled with mystery and excitement? Kit is the newest heroine to go down the proverbial rabbit hole in the new game Another Sight, the debut release from Italian developer Lunar Great Wall Studios. It's a platforming/puzzle game where a girl teams up with a cat to escape a rich and imaginative underground world deep below London's bustling streets. Kit may have bumped her head and bruised her soul, but does that lead to a must play game? That's the question.

We don't know a lot about Kit at the start of Another Sight. She mysteriously wakes up confused and disoriented, only to then fall down a giant hole when the ground gives out and finds herself alone and scared in a confusing new world. And it's not just her surroundings that are weird, because she discovers that her sight has changed and she can see with her eyes closed and visualize sounds. She's basically a very timid version of Daredevil.

When I say that Kit is alone, that's not entirely true. She's befriended by an adorable red cat with two different color eyes. This cat is not only the guide through his surreal world, but also a helper that will allow Kit to meet famous painters, musicians and inventors, all while getting to the bottom of this mystery.

The truth is, Kit would be helpless without the cat. Her new eyes may come with some unique benefits, but it makes it hard for her to see what's off in the distance. She's essentially walking blind, which creates a whole bunch of problems when the goal is to escape. In order to solve this problem, you'll need to switch between Kit and the cat in order to help each other out. If you've been waiting for a developer to mix Alice in Wonderland with The Lost Vikings, then this is the game for you.

I know that comes off as sarcastic, but this is a genuinely cool setup to a game. The two characters couldn't be more different and allow for two different types of gameplay. Kit is the cautious type who is good at pulling levers, while all of the 2D platforming stuff is put on the furry shoulders of the cat. He's small, fits into a bunch of cramped areas and navigates through levels that feel like they were pulled straight out of the original Prince of Persia.

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If it sounds like the cat gets all the interesting stuff, then it's because that's exactly what happens. Walking around a dark world you can barely see is kind of a drag, and the game never fully figures out what to do with Kit. She's mainly there to push boxes and solve the puzzles that require opposable thumbs. Even when Another Sight suddenly becomes a stealth game in the final act, Kit is somehow given very little to do. There are large portions of the game where she mostly hides behind rocks while the cat gets everything done.

It doesn't help that the puzzles are rarely that difficult or interesting. So much of this game revolves around standing on door triggers and using levers to call elevators. Up until the stealth stuff kicks in, almost every puzzle involved the two trying to open doors make it from point A to point B. This is all familiar stuff and there's nothing about this retelling that stands out in any meaningful way. There are a few larger brain-teasers that will involve a fair bit of memorization, but on average the puzzles are competent at best and completely forgettable at worst.

Unfortunately, that also describes the locations we find Kit traveling to. Sure, there are surreal moments here and there, but a lot of the game just looks like broken down versions of what you would see above ground. I was hoping that the nature of the story would lead to a more over-the-top adventure filled with breath-taking visuals, but this is a weirdly grounded world we're exploring. This blandness is at odds with the zany story it's trying to tell. If we're going to dive deep into the wonderland, then I'm expecting something a lot weirder.

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I also expect something a bit more satisfying. While you don't know much about Kit early on, we start to learn more about her life, goals and heartbreak. The best thing I can say about this game is that I never knew where it was going next. I was intrigued right up to the very end, which is when the game completely runs out of steam. We get a choice between two possible endings, but sadly neither of them is as interesting as the mystery. It leaves a lot of questions unanswered and largely ignores elements that felt important. There are pieces of the finale that work for me, but it's ultimately a big letdown.

And that's a good way to describe Another Sight -- a big letdown. There's a cool idea here and solid characters in Kit and the cat, but there's nothing we haven't seen countless times before. So much of this game is masked in darkness, and it got to the point where I loathed having to switch back to Kit to solve a puzzle. This is a surreal adventure that could have benefited from being a whole lot weirder.