HUE AND DRY
HUE FLOWING is a platformer dripping with style
Filling in a map is one of the best things in games. The best and the worst, as you may find your perfectionist tendencies taking over. Surprisingly, that didn’t happen for me in Hue Flowing, probably because it’s only 15 minutes long.
The entire level is swaddled in a thick fog of war, and you can only clear it by jumping around. The arc of your jump removes the foggy top layer of the canvas, revealing a world of pretty floating islands below.
It is odd, to jump in a platformer and not know if you’re going to land safely on a platform, or tumble into the void. However, for the most part death is no bother, simply taking you back to the last platform you were on. Your first few minutes are a frenzy of leaping and drawing, as you gradually fill in the map.
The most satisfying thing about Hue Flowing is a visual effect that I suspect impacts the performance. Your leaping brush-strokes trickle down the screen, as if they’re dripping water. It feels like you’re painting with watercolours.
Oh, and underneath all that map-filling there’s an enjoyable micro-platformer: a Metroidvania where you go from chump to God.
With Celeste-like controls, Hue Flowing goes beyond it in a way by giving you double, then triple… ultimately six jumps before you need to hit the ground. It feels obscene, in a good way, but you’ll need them all to beat some difficult platforming sections, and reach the ending.
Not that there is a proper ending, but the satisfaction of mastering this world, and uncovering its floating islands, is enough.