[Review] TEN - Nintendo Switch

Developed By: The Bworg
Published By: Ratalaika Games
Categories: Platformer
Release Date: 06.03.22

Ten. Ten seconds. Can you last ten seconds? Everything is out to kill you, like some sick experiment, so I hope you can.

If I had to compare TEN to one game, it’d be a cute little DSiWare and now eShop title named Ten Second Run. Grab everything, get to the end of the stage, and don’t die, all within ten seconds. TEN is kinda similar in how ten seconds is key proponent and you’ll need to avoid death, but there is no real goal. Just don’t die.

TEN is hard. Very hard. You need to get from one end of a floor to the other, each room having ten seconds. Everything hurts, saws, lasers, guns, spikes. You die once and you’re back to the beginning. You’ve got the coins to grab each room too. This first floor will feel overwhelming, perhaps even frustrating, but once you get the patterns down, you’ll finally be going up.

Once we advance a floor, the game opens up a bit more, explains a bit more, even has some lore. First up is a safe room. A small reprieve from everything trying to kill you. Some folk to talk to, some beds, they even have pizza! As if that makes up for anything. These rest areas are going to be your best friend. That pizza is infinite and can heal you whenever needed, especially if you get nervous right before a room and you have little health. There’s also nice little tube you can step in, which grants you some life saving powerups.

Hope you were diligently collecting coins, since you’ll need them for these. Double Jumps, dashes, floating, more health are just some of what’s in store. Maybe you want to slow down bullets to look cool or have coins magnetize to you. There’s even powerups that actually make the game harder, if you dare. You can go back to this tube, or even the safe room whenever, though your timer will keep going when you do. But it’s a good way to checkpoint your coins in a run.

TEN is simple. Not just in it’s premise, but in it’s art direction. But like how something simple can be fun, it can also be beautiful. TEN has fantastic spritework and animation. The color pallet being limited is a huge plus for visibility. Black, white, red, orange. If you see anything remotely red, MOVE OUT OF THE WAY. It is upmost of important for a game where you need to move fast and pay attention to have good visibility.

Something I didn’t quite notice at first, but then it slowly crept up on me was the music. TEN’s soundtrack is really good. It perfectly fits the suspense and tension these stages in the game give off. Better yet, after you clear a floor, you can listen to the music whenever!

Despite being incredibly hard, and perhaps frustrating, I never once had an issue with it, nor felt like the game was at fault when I died. This is all because of how smooth, quick, and precise the controls feel. It kept me hooked. It says a lot about a game to feel good to play, even when all you do is die, and boy will you die. It even counts how many you get!

If you can handle this, give TEN a try, it’s definitely a good time.