Giga Wrecker Alt.

Giga Wrecker Alt marries puzzling with Metroidvania beautifully, offering up just enough challenge without getting in its own way. Despite its few stumbles, Giga Wrecker Alt is one of those out-of-nowhere games that's well worth your time.

Giga Wrecker Alt. is a physics-based puzzle platformer that falls down in the same places as most games in the genre, but with interesting characters an intriguing story, it's a decent game on the whole. Just be aware that the difficulty is real, so if that’s a deterrent, consider yourself warned.

An action-platformer with quite a few novel mechanics and interesting design is partially let down by some sluggish controls.

A cool and unique physics-based puzzle platformer from the house of Pokémon, Giga Wrecker Alt. has some nice twists and mechanics. It's found a perfect home on console.

After making the enjoyable 2015 platformer Tembo the Badass Elephant, Game Freak is at it again with a new 2D action / puzzle hybrid.

Giga Wrecker Alt is a re-release of a computer game that came out in 2017 that I had never even heard of prior to this review, despite it being made by none other than Game Freak, the same guys behind the Pokémon games. It’s an interesting game that, unfortunately, doesn’t hold up to the standards of the developer’s other works.

So, mainly thanks to its dull combat and floaty controls, Giga Wrecker Alt. isn’t the game it could have been. There’s a great story waiting to be unravelled if you have the patience to work through the game’s issues, but a few hours in, it really will become a slog. Giga Wrecker Alt. is a unique game, for sure, but uniqueness alone doesn’t make something good. The basics have to be there first, and in this case, they’re just not.

Creators of Pokémon or not, some interesting ideas can’t override the terrible execution in this staggeringly ugly 2D platformer.