14 DAY TRIAL // 
A fast dodge allows my character to avoid an incoming attack and puts her in a prime spot for a counterattack. A series of quick swipes eliminates the creature but, unfortunately, I don’t get the perfect food drop I was hoping for. Still, I get into a Cortex, unlock a new attack pattern, and prepare myself for what appears to be a boss battle straight ahead.
This enraged creature isn’t easy to deal with. It can fly, it is protected by a shield, and it is constantly attacking with energy orbs and by dropping pillars from the ceiling. The idea, as always, is to learn the patterns, force it to expose a weak spot, and go to town on that while avoiding taking too much damage. It takes around eight tries, but I manage to kill the beast and push my way to my target, a sleeping shaman.
That’s when another character intervenes and delivers some exposition that I only half understand. I’m hoping that I will get a solid character upgrade, one that’s not linked to food. Instead, after a short cutscene, I am dropped right back to the beginning of my adventure. Oh, I have none of the abilities, like a double jump, that I earned so far. Let’s hope that it is very easy to get them back.
Ultros is developed by Hadoque, with publishing in the hands of El Huervo and Kepler Ghost. I played it on the PC via Steam. The title is also on the PlayStation 5 and the PS4. It combines traditional action platformer elements with more exotic ideas, like gardening, and some rogue elements.
Players control a female astronaut with no memory. She has crashed her ship into something like a massive space station, filled with both a wide variety of life and some peculiar inhabitants. The structure, which is orbiting a black hole that generates time paradoxes, is also home to a demon and a cabal of shamans.
The game’s narrative universe reveals itself slowly, as players explore and engage with the world. At crucial moments, the time loop gets reset. The idea is to get to all the shamans and extract their tech to then deal with Ultros himself, filling the space station with life along the way. The game is focused on environmental storytelling, which is an asset for such a great-looking experience.
Ultros starts off as a pretty classic action platformer, although it doesn’t fully align with the Metroidvania genre. Our hero is fast but can initially only perform one jump and a crouching slide to navigate levels. She also quickly picks up a short sword and uses fast combos to deal with enemies in melee. But it takes a while before a double jump is added to the movement arsenal, linked to an extractor that can store emotions.
A heavy attack becomes important, especially to destroy walls and reveal new paths. The wealth of life in this universe ties into gameplay. Most enemies drop some sort of food, of better quality if players manage to execute a wider variety of attacks during the encounter. These, alongside the fruits that Ouji can pick up from what she plants, can be consumed at alcoves that also enable saving.
Achieve the right nutritional balance and you can open up a new ability or enhance an existing one. Use those for more exploration and to deal with more capable enemies. Push to a boss battle, clear that one, try to get to a shaman, and get a clearer idea of the massive ship you’re exploring. And, along the way, curate gardens that provide fruits but also make areas easier to move through.
On top of everything, Ultros adds a loop concept. When players get to one of the shamans, they get a nice piece of narrative. Then the world resets and their character is back at the start. All those upgrades that you invested food in? Gone, unless the player has spent a rare resource to make them invulnerable to the black hole’s effects. Even the extractor that powers the double jump needs to be found again. It’s a surprising move that will define how many players feel about the entire title.
The backtracking is tedious and will limit a player’s immersion. Players annoyed by the reset might find this the best place to quit. But it also creates a connection with the environment and allows players to test other unlocks before deciding which of them are crucial to their playstyle. Ultros gradually offers gamers the tools required to tame the loop and find their way to the demon.
Ultros looks impressive, with graphics designed to reflect the promise of alien worlds embedded in the narrative. It’s colorful and bright, with a ton of art that blends with the environments in interesting ways and unique enemy designs. It might take players a little time to notice all the areas that can be attacked to open up new areas to explore, but that’s a minor issue. The interface is unobtrusive, with an easy-to-read map.
The sound design is almost as good. Characters are not voiced but that’s not a major issue. Combat sounds a little weak, mainly because the swooshes of the various blades are too similar. The general squishiness of the environment feels all right and mixes well with the music, which is good enough that I never felt like replacing it with something more propulsive.
The Good
- Impressive world
- Immersive graphics and soundtrack
- Complex mechanics
The Bad
- Under-explained core ideas
- Loss of abilities on time loop
- Some paths are hard to notice
Conclusion
But neither is enough to keep players engaged in the long run if they don’t already like this mix of exploration, combat, and platforming. And the game offers limited details about many of its systems, with the constant loops adding to the confusion. Ultros requires patience and a significant time investment but it offers an immersive world and good core mechanics.
Review key provided by the publisher.
