Metroidvanias, or labyrinthine platformers as I prefer to call them, are a genre that’s always painted with broad brush strokes. Most games in this genre tend to be very paint by the numbers in terms of design philosophy, and many also tend to put story on the back burner and don’t really say much of anything on top of well-designed environments or bosses. Constance is a labyrinthine platformer that explores mental health issues in a poignant way while also having many of the elements that will be familiar to those who love the genre. So, is Constance worth the ink and effort, or is this a labyrinthine platformer you should brush off? Let’s find out.
Plot Ahoy!
Constance takes a while to let you peer behind the curtain, but it is about an artist of the same name who is being crushed by the pressure of responsibilities placed on her. As she struggles to deal with the things that stress her out, she’s transported into a world inside her own mind, filled with danger, traps, and a strangely large number of robots. The story is surprisingly deep, covering topics like burnout, depression, anxiety, and loads more topics related to mental health. Nothing will be spoiled here, but the subject matter of Constance’s tale will be deeply relatable to a lot of people and for good reason.
It’s available on every console including the PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X, and the Nintendo Switch 2. It’s also available for the PC through the Steam platform.
Review Notes
Constance is an approach to labyrinthine platformers with a new coat of paint (pun fully intended). You have your typical movement abilities and unlock more powers that let you traverse new areas in already explored zones, coupled with attacking abilities that allow you to take on the variety of bosses found throughout Constance’s mental world. Players begin with the basics, like a jump and dash that can go through enemies and obstacles, but it doesn’t take long to acquire a variety of new powers that can be used for both combat and puzzle solving. Players will also find heart piece and paint flask upgrades that increase their health and paint reservoirs, respectively, allowing players longer survival in combat and to make more use of Constance’s special abilities.
Utilizing Constance’s powers to transform into paint to descend walls or stab her paint brush in specific directions requires you use her paint gauge, which needs to be managed carefully, as overuse of her abilities and emptying the gauge will cause your powers to consume your health instead, quickly leading to a potential loss. Overutilization of the paint gauge was surprisingly more common during platforming/puzzle challenges than during combat, though some of the instances I ran into where this occurred the most was because I was sequence breaking on accident. I… may not have known there was a double jump, and encountered a whole area suspended over a death pit that I used the other abilities of Constance to stay airborne and just barely made it to the other side to claim the prize. Whoops!
One fun feature in Constance is that, normally in games like these, dying during exploration or a boss fight will send you back to a checkpoint, but in this game you have the choice to go back to the checkpoint, or respawn right where you died in exchange for enhancing all enemies until you next rest at a checkpoint. Thankfully, most boss fights have checkpoints near them, so you won’t really need to utilize this mechanic a whole lot when it comes to fighting the biggest and baddest foes around, but it is worth mentioning that there are several bosses in Constance that will demand your attention and at least a little respect when you go up against them.
Boss design in Constance is great, having unique attack patterns and a lot of visual polish, and while you might die a time or two throughout the game’s brief run time, you’ll never be left wondering if you can even surmount the challenge. You will knock that card-wielding baddie off its pedestal, it’s only an issue of pattern recognition and is a when, not an if. A few of the bosses may return later for encore fights, but I believe they boasted a few new attacks when they did so, as well.
The world of Constance is a joy to look at in every single area. All of the artwork for it looks to be hand drawn, and the gorgeously animated characters and environments are wonderful to traverse with most of the enemies and objects being very obviously identifiable even when playing handheld on a Nintendo Switch. Each area has its own interesting setting with traps and stellar visual design, from the Chaotic Carnival to the Vanishing Vaults, and players can explore it pretty freely when unlocking new abilities or returning if needed to grab a power up that couldn’t be obtained the first time through a zone. Speaking of, objects of interest on the map can be marked using a handy photograph power that lets you precisely capture exactly the location that may need to be returned to in the future- this feature is simple in function and similar to tools available in many other titles, but turning it into something artsy like photography makes the world of Constance feel that much more cohesive.
If you have a Nintendo Switch 2, there are a variety of visual fidelity modes to choose from, which I primarily played Constance at Max Quality until I reached the Vanishing Vaults, where I encountered a few frame drops that elicited I swap to Performance mode for just that area. That’s likely something that can be fixed in an update later down the line, but I was perfectly pleased with how well the game ran up until the Vaults, and immediately after that location it went back to running like a dream.
TLDR
Overall, Constance is a lovely 2D labyrinthine platformer with a simple but very relatable story that combines beautifully hand-drawn artwork with well-designed environments, above average boss fights, and a great focus on traversal. Constance can absolutely be the game for you. The Metriodvania conventions that Constance breaks are the ones that players usually find the most annoying, such as the respawn mechanic that empowers enemies, but it doesn’t do a lot else to revolutionize the genre.
Of course, not everything has to completely flip a genre on its head, and it’s for that reason that Constance is absurdly charming on all fronts and a solid pickup for anyone who enjoys labyrinthine platformers with tight controls and good combat.
