Canari Games, the studio behind 2023's fantastic cinematic platformer Lunark, revealed an adorable Link's Awakening-inspired adventure earlier this year. Back then, the game was only confirmed for PC, but today, the developer has revealed that the game is indeed coming to Switch — and soon!
Castaway launches on Nintendo Switch and all other platforms on 16th August 2024 and will only set you back USD $7.99 / GBP £6.99. In the game, you play as Martin, an adventurer who crash-lands on an island. His pet soon gets kidnapped (pet-napped?) and he has to go and save him.
Castaway is an extremely bite-sized take on the Zelda formula; its Story Mode should only take you a couple of hours to beat, but clearing that will unlock Survivor Mode. Here, you'll get to scale a 50-floor tower which will deliver challenges aplenty. Plus, it just looks darn lovely, with colourful GBA-esque visuals and a catchy soundtrack.
Canari Games wants Castaway to cater to all ages, and there are various modes and difficulty options that will allow the player to tailor the game to their needs. 'Pacifist' will take enemies out of the game, leaving just the simple puzzles to solve; there's an 'invincible' setting that will give you the option to fight without fear of dying; if you want a challenge, then 'unfair' mode might just be for you.
There's even a speedrunning mode to see how long it takes you to defeat all three bosses and rescue your little pet. Almost everything you could ever want from a little adventure like this.
We're big fans of Lunark, so when Canari Games announced Castaway in April, we were praying for a Switch release. Luckily, it's coming, and very, very soon.
Castaway launches on Switch on 16th August. Will you be crash-landing for this one? Come to shore in the comments.
Comments 22
Wow, seems to borrow a little too much inspiration…
Ok. Seems to me like it’s a good thing, especially since it’s based on Link’s Awakening.
Looks great to be fair.
Has slight shades of Star Tropics, too.
Looks almost too derivative so far, but I hope to be proven wrong.
I'll add it to Deku deals, when it drops to a dollar or 2 I'll probably pick it up. I loved Gato Roboto and have found myself revisiting it quite often, since it's just an hour or two to beat. I'd love a fun Zelda like equivalent.
What is with developers just straight up copying old Nintendo games? I understand inspiration, but this isn’t flattery, it’s plagiarism. Are they really that obsessed with these games or do they not have any original ideas? It can’t be the latter. Help make it make sense.
I seem to inevitably buy all these sorts of games, even though almost all of them are not very good, and some are just okay. I just can't resist the draw of the promise of classic mid era Zelda.
@WaveBoy to be fair, I feel like any game that has you ship wrecked would probably start out like that. Maybe the sword on the dock/ beach was also a little samey, but same kinda thing, if he was a sword guy the wreck.
@WaveBoy Have you heard of Pipistrello and the Cursed Yoyo? It's another upcoming 2D Zelda-like game (taking inspiration from the GB/GBA entries) that sets itself apart when it comes to the world and elements of the gameplay akin to what Mina appears to be doing
@PikaPhantom Oh wow, I've not heard of that one, but it looks great!
i feel like i've read this exact article every other week for years now. 😵💫
So they took all the assets from Link's awakening DX and added pterodactyls and some sort of house from Namek. This seems like a pure coincidence, and definitely not a rip-off.
Nintendo will be going after them.
A lot of those assets are directly lifted from Zelda and pokemon
The stones, trees are Zelda,
The walls and barriers are pokemon
I raised an eyebrow at first but I actually don't think this is TOO obvious a ripoff. It seems to be closer to an action-y styled game rather than a typical Zelda adventure.
Also some of you need to look more into GBC games. There are several 3rd party games that actually do look almost like romhacks of Link's Awakening or Pokemon.
Well they can either make a crummy Zelda game and get attention, or an even crummier original game with zero looks, which do u think is more appealing? Lol
@WaveBoy @LadyCharlie Sorry had to chime in as a big fan of StarTropics. Part 1 had a better theme than part 2, but part 2's gameplay was far better-- Definitely had the same silly humor, but not as clever as the first. I still say play it!
As far as this game, I actually like the bitesized rip on LA as I wouldn't want it being a perfect clone anyway, so I'll see how it reviews.
Boring. Bring some attention to something original for a change, even if it sucks. At least show a game that is taking a risk/being innovative.
Looks fun, but some of those sprites are a little too close to the inspiration. Maybe they’re placeholder? But the crystals and some of the rocks are just a bit close for comfort.
I've played Lunark and whatever these guys are doing next definitely gets my attention. It was awesome and after all these flashback wannabes it felt like somebody truly finally understood the charm of the original.
Happy that this finally has a release date, as a big Link's Awakening fan of course I'll eventually get it!
Looking forward to this as I hated the graphic style of the switch remake (it's fine but not in keeping with the original games tone)
ANOTHER Zelda clone…
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