There is perhaps no genre I love more in this world than “game where you run around as a little guy,” for the subgenres within that are almost endless. A new entry is soon to find itself within that genre, and it’s called Cinderline, a game where you play as an anthropomorphic, silent bird who wants to make the last ever s’more, gathering the various pieces required to do so by travelling from town to town in a tiny train.

Cinderline is not a particularly complicated game to play, you’d probably call it a walking simulator with a platformer veneer. As mentioned, you play as a bird who can hop around the place, and that’s sort of it. This bird was just born, the game opening up upon the very moment it hatched, and with the surreality that followed a touch of Angel’s Egg was brought to mind, in that same way you’re thrust into a world with little context, and also the literal egg thing.

Almost immediately upon awakening you discover a train, mechanical and involved. There are two levers, one which lets you go forward or reverse, the other controlling the speed, and while gripping onto them you must physically move the camera up or down to put them into action. No automation to be found here, adding the tiniest layer of depth and friction to an otherwise simple process. In the short runtime of the demo you don’t get to do all that much with the train, so I hope it’s more than just a literal vehicle to take you from strange locale to stranger locale.

And strange the locales are. Your first stop is an underground station with off kilter creatures and people who don’t particularly clue you in to what’s going on in this world. In the first town you find yourself in, a town covered in a mysterious, snowy ash, a toaster gets frightened by your appearance, asking you to retrieve its toast in exchange for a reward. A shady man in a black trench coat offers you a pickaxe in exchange for a crumb of the toast. Eventually, you find yourself in front of a sentient, cigar-smoking balloon who gets eaten by a giant pair of gnashers, leaving behind a stick, the very stick you need to make the last s’more.

Upon this acquisition, you find all the strange people you met are gone. Is your quest to make the last s’more, a goal you, the person playing, doesn’t know the impetus behind, one that may bring ruin and solitude to this world? It’s deliciously ominous contrasted against the colourful, silly, mysterious characters that inhabit the lands you run across. This is certainly a game more about vibes over something with more complexity, but the morsel of vibes on offer make me hungry for more at least. And for a s’more, it seems. A shame graham crackers are so hard to get in the UK!

Anyway, you can wishlist Cinderline, or try out the demo for yourself, on Steam.