Blue Fire is a game I like, but I don’t love. It’s a game I want to love - it draws influences from some of my favorite games, broadly 3D Platformers but with a bit of Zelda, Metroid, and Dark Souls thrown in for good measure. But despite this, it just doesn’t all come together as well as I hoped.

The developers describe it as a 3D Metroidvania Platformer, but calling it a Metroidvania feels like a bit of a stretch. There are certainly elements of that, but I think it draws more heavily from Ocarina of Time. As you progress in the game, you do gain new movement abilities like the dash and the double jump, which allow you to get back to places that were out of reach before. But the similarities don’t go much deeper.

Instead, like Ocarina of Time, the game features spaces that feel directly influenced by Zelda’s dungeons, complete with light swordplay, finding different keys in chests, solving simple puzzles, and ending up in a boss encounter to punctuate the experience. And the similarities don’t end there. The game’s quests also feel quite akin to those in a Zelda game, though admittedly simpler.

However, at Blue Fire’s core is its 3D platforming, and it does that very well, with one notable exception, but we’ll cover that later. Getting around the world of Penumbra is very satisfying and unlocking new movement abilities only made that more and more enjoyable. Navigating the 3D space, finding secrets, and just progressing through the game feels great.

Once you have a feel for the way the game moves, you can really push the boundaries of what’s reachable. I always love that feeling of mastering the repertoire of moves and using it to exceed the boundaries of what should be possible. Blue Fire absolutely offers this type of precision platforming that has a high skill ceiling.

Interspersed through the world are Voids - within each you’ll be treated to a unique precision platforming challenge and have the opportunity to nab 30 collectibles. There’s no combat in these Void challenges, but there are two checkpoints along the way to the end of the level. Completing them gives you another heart in your life gauge (think Zelda, again) and in total there are 16 in the game to conquer.

For the most part, the void challenges are great, but the hardest of the bunch were absolutely miserable to complete. If you know me, you know that brutal platforming is one of my favorite genres, but Blue Fire’s version of that was not at all to my taste.

I alluded to this earlier, but this is where the platforming kind of falls apart for me. In the hardest voids, you’re forced into very precise setups that absolutely require repeated deaths to learn the appropriate approach. But the game’s movement started to feel quite unwieldy here, causing me to slip off platforms or boost right past or just short of a target because of the difficulty of perceiving depth. 

And the game gives you very little room for mistakes, leading to some grueling grinds at the end. These voids even had some unfair sections where at the end of a long segment, you can wind up in the midst of a set of moving obstacles where there’s literally no path to success. Fighting through a tough section, only to be presented with an unwinnable situation is extremely frustrating and it happened pretty frequently in these final voids.

Incredibly, the game received free DLC, where they doubled down and made even harder voids. I suppose these challenges are for someone, but after the first two, I decided that someone wasn’t me.

Blue Fire is at its peak when you’re at full capability and able to traverse the world with the most ease - this is where the game really opens up. Leading up to this point, the game can feel a little meandering and it can be confusing as to where you need to go.

There are a handful of fire springs throughout the game, which are effectively Souls bonfires. Here you can equip spirits, which you’ll find or purchase in the world, to enhance your abilities. For instance, one makes you dash further, another makes it so that when you pick up currency you get double, or your health refills fill more hearts. You can purchase more spirit slots from an NPC using currency from killing enemies, so it’s easy to expand your equippable slots.

The game also has some simple combat, but fighting enemies feels more like a distraction than part of the attraction. It’s more meaningful in the boss fights, but again, it feels very similar to Zelda here, where you’re just waiting for the right opening to attack and then whittling away the boss’ health.

Though Blue Fire was by and large a good game, it also feels like it walks in the shadows of its influences - attempting to mimic their successes without establishing an identity of its own. Considering the game goes on sale frequently, if you’re a fan of 3D Platformers, it’s worth a look - you could spend your time and money in much worse ways.