Released in 2013 and criminally overlooked by me, who doesn't like a bit of platforming spelunking, courtesy of Ron Gilbert.

I don't know how I found it, but about 90 minutes in I am glad that I did.

Caves have been at the forefront of adventure gaming since the get-go (a colossal one comes to mind) so why wouldn't Mr. Gilbert use it as a setting? And why not make the cave the narrator?? A very sultry and droll one it is indeed.

Whilst it's a single person game, you control a party of three, each of them with their own special ability. You have to choose your three explorers from seven available at the very start, and off you go. I have yet to actively choose any ability, but have benefited more than once from the ability of one individual.

You progress through the cave scrolling left and right, and all three have to regularly work together. You can mouse-wheel between them, or utilise the little diagram bottom left; just choose the appropriate image and you switch control. Get one to pull one lever, another to pull a second, and run the third through the opening to be able to move on.

Usefully there are times when they all follow whichever character is active, eliminating the need to go back and gather them individually. At other times, generally whilst in the throes of solving a puzzle, you have to work them individually. Which is part of the problem solving fun.

You can't die in the cave, as the cave will tell you, which really means you can die but get to try again. My deaths so far have largely been as a result of missing a jump, or failing to run away quickly enough from a dynamite blast. As far as platforming goes it has been fairly gentle to date, the main difficulties being how to move forward. I suspect that might change as I move on.

You will pick up items, but each character can only carry one item at a time. It hasn't proved to be an issue to date, but I may have to make choices later on.

None of my characters have spoken to each other at this stage, and apart from the cave's narration, the only other spoken word has been courtesy of the gift shop attendant. Most of the sound has been ambient and soundtrack.

It has a quirky and colourful visual style, and despite the lack of dialogue has been sardonically amusing thus far. I have found a few comic book pages, which suggest a deeper understanding of things once I get to the end.

I look forward to what else this cave has in store.

Have you had this since 2013, Draclvr ??
And which Windows version are you using to play it ??

(I found it advertised at “Double Fine Productions” but haven’t followed up yet to see if it’s still for sale.)

EDIT :

Oh, it might be available from GOG so I’ll go look 😑

I am playing on my current system Mad.

Oh, thanks for that info, flotsam 👍👍

Mad, I don't have the game. I just do the conversion to HTML so we can publish the reviews to the website. Flotsam is the game player!

Thanks flotsam (and Drac)! Platforming is not really my thing!

Thank you for the first look, flotsam! Much appreciated.

And thank you for your help, Drac.

Thanks for the first look, flotsam! I never played the game.

Thank you Drac!

Ana

FYI Mad, gremlin did a review back in the day which will tell you some more about the game.
Having played on (about four hours) it continues to be a piece of platforming /puzzling fun, the collaboration between each of your three characters a highlight. It isn't easy, in terms of how to move on, but it rewards continued effort.
One thing worth noting is the 'save and exit" command from the menu. You can't save at will, and despite what it says this command does not save at the point you exit. However it works, what it doesn't do is let you eg save just before you try to blow stuff up and get away. The reloaded save seemed to be the resurrection point, which meant backtracking to get dynamite and trying again. I will experiment with this aspect as I go along.