Swallow the Sea

Exploring an ocean of hungry horrors.

You play as a little cell that levels up by swallowing orange, blobby things, before using your newfound power to smash through barriers, and reach new parts of the world. You’ll do this a fair few times, gathering even more blobby things, and breaking down bigger barriers, all the while increasing in presence until you resemble a human embryo encased in a bubble.

But the sea isn’t kind to people, even when they’re weird fish-baby creatures, and most of the things down here are keen to gobble you up – or at least to trap you in place so you’re easier prey for their carnivorous mates. So, you have to dodge and dash to give these increasingly horrible sea creatures the slip, while you explore and gather blobs in an aquatic environment.

You will die, quite a bit, in SwallowtheSea, but the checkpoints are pretty generous, and you’ll want to persist in order to witness its powerful ending. This is a game all about ‘the power curve’, that sacred cow of game development: you get stronger, and your enemies feel more trivial as the game goes on. TOM SYKES

It’s like Alien:Isolation, but with a humanoid snake, and set under the sea.