Hands On: She Remembered Caterpillars Is A Wonderfully Clever Puzzle Game

The Indie Megabooth at PAX East 2017 was full of an abundance of cool indie games vying for everyone's attention on the show floor. While some of them went by unnoticed, one that stood way out to us during the convention was Jumpsuit Entertainment's She Remembered Caterpillars.

She Remembered Caterpillars is a gorgeous puzzle game built around a seemingly simply mechanic of getting coloured grub-like creatures across a map onto a portal. You start off easy having two different coloured grubs that only cross like-coloured bridges, but new obstacles are introduced as you progress. This constant reinvention is a big component of the game according David Priemer, one of its devs.

This was on full display with the time we got to spend with the game too, as level-to-level – we played about eight or nine of the stages – a new mechanic or element was introduced, making the challenge increase at a pretty steady level. According to Priemer, this was one of the game's biggest challenges, as successfully increasing the challenge while introducing new mechanics at an impressive pace was rather tricky. One source of inspiration that the team looked to while making the game was Hitman Go.

Luckily the implementation of mechanics was very successful in our opinion. The brief time we spent with the game was immensely rewarding, and offered a satisfying way to approach puzzles logically. Brief bits of trial-and-error to test out the new systems per level gave way to "aha" moments, allowing for analytical solutions to be reached. One puzzle in particular had us mapping out a solution in our head before doing anything on screen.

This is all the more impressive when you consider that the mechanics for the game were discovered almost by accident. Priemer says he was just working with physical layers in Unity and practically stumbled into the idea for the game's mechanics, and the game went from there. Not too shabby considering how interesting and fun the game is to play.

While the game is out on PC already, we asked about a PS4 version of the game, and while it is coming, it is still a way off. The porting process is very early on, so while we might not be able to look forward to this being on Sony's platforms anytime soon, it is something to look forward to nonetheless.

Are you looking forward to She Remembered Caterpillars like a Hungry Caterpillar? Cross the coloured bridge to the comments section below.