Brave the darkness in this free indie game
The Forgotten Caves of Foolish Linger is a free adventure video game wherein you must journey through a mysterious cavern in order to escape it. Developed by Oliver Hightower, this is an atmospheric 2D indie platformer game that offers tricky platforming gameplay and gloomy pixelated art.
Similar to Amnesia: The Dark Descent, The Forgotten Caves of Foolish Linger does not shy away from addressing dark and adult themes in its storytelling. From the characters you meet to the obstacles you face, everything is designed to test your courage despite the lack of creepy jump scares.
An end to this dangerous journey
The story of The Forgotten Caves of Foolish Linger begins with you waking up inside a dark and mysterious cavern—seemingly endless as you explore it. You don’t know how you got there but the only way can be out. Along the way, you must tread carefully lest you fall into the hard-to-see gaps on the ground. You’ll also encounter strange characters who’ll make you question your own resolve to escape.
When starting off, you’ll quickly notice that the controls here are easy to figure out but no tutorial actually comes to instruct you. To see the full list of keybindings, you’ll have to open the Controls menu. You can’t rebind them but they at least work another way—such as WASD and directional arrow keys working for the movement controls. The only settings you can toggle are the fullscreen mode.
Gameplay-wise, the platforms are challenging but also unfair at times. The difficulty scales erratically and you can’t set it to an easier mode. The dialogues you unlock serve as a great inspiration to finish the game, though. You’ll often find them to be philosophical and are meant to teach a lesson about fear, courage, the darkness, and many more mature topics.
Needs some tweaking
Overall, The Forgotten Caves of Foolish Linger is a great choice for an indie platformer game if you like huge chunks of narrative interwoven with difficult gameplay. While the platforming can be frustrating, it’s not at the level of hardcore titles like Celeste and Hollow Knight so you can at least be sure that it can be finished. Still, it would help to have the tutorial play in-game.
