Promenade launched in February 2024 on all consoles and PC. It’s by indie team Holy Cap in Nantes, France, who have created a charming and colourful platformer here.
The goal is to collect golden cogs and unlock new areas, which you access via an enormous elevator. From this concept, its sense of imagination and creativity with platforming mechanics is often magnificent. Thus, let’s journey on in and explore!
Scale That Mighty Elevator in Promenade
At its best, Promenade is genuinely one of the best 2D platformers we’ve played in quite some time. It may not consistently hit those high notes, but it’s still a mighty fine effort.
Players take control of a dude called Nemo, who almost DROWNS TO DEATH (!!!) at the start of his adventure. He’s saved by a purple octopus thing, who nurses him back to health, then they become besties.
One day, they head off on an adventure. That’s when they discover The Great Elevator, which needs you to collect many golden cogs to restore it to working order.
You then go off, solve puzzles, clear areas, gain cogs, and scale up the elevator.
A simple gameplay mechanic, but one that can be very rewarding. Promenade’s controls can be fiddly at first, but the clever and engaging set of motions Nemo has really help to unlock the game’s full potential. As well as some elements of Metroidvania.
And there are some wonderful moments, such as the Cosmic Cruise area where you get to fly a little spaceship.
Despite its cutesy appearance, Promenade is one tough game. This is not “for kids”, it’s for experienced gamers who know what to look out for.
As it wears its inspirations proudly, as we could see elements of the glorious Rayman Origins (2011) and Nintendo classic Yoshi’s Island (1995) throughout. Two of the very best platformers from history.
And you really get bang for your buck here, as there’s about eight hours of gameplay. Plus a load of secrets to unearth if you want to 100% everything. But over the challenge, and regular imaginative surprises, it’s just the charm offensive that works. You feel delighted to be in this world.
To go with its DELIGHTFUL artistic style, there’s an often lovely score by French composer Yponeko
A lot of the music is very upbeat, but some of it has a more melancholic ambiance going on. Such as with Farewell friend below.
A must for platforming fans, then, as Promenade has bags of appeal and will appeal to those with an inquisitive nature.
Its surprising difficulty may put some off, as the more abstract puzzles and backtracking between levels can be a bit irksome. But minor quibbles aside, this is a joy of a mini-Metroidvania and something of an obscure gem.
