Webbed game review

It’s a nice, sunny day and our spider friend is hanging out with her shiny boyfriend when suddenly, down swoops a bird and plucks him away! She needs to find him before it’s too late, but how? The friendly bugs of the bush, that’s how! The bugs have had enough of the mean bowerbird and decide to band together to help find our spider friends boyfriend and get rid of the bird for good.

The spiders are super cute and friendly in Webbed, but if you’re afraid of spiders, you can play the game without them! There is an arachnophobia mode in the accessibility settings that turns the spiders into cute little blob creatures! It’s a nice feature that I probably would never have thought of. Please note, all the images on this post were taken with arachnophobia mode turned off.

Gameplay

Run, jump, dance and spin a sticky web to get around in this puzzle platformer. In Webbed, you will use your web to get across wide gaps, help bugs and solve puzzles. The web brings an added complexity to the game but also an interesting variation on standard platformers. You also have a little laser shooter, should you need to break away web and platforms. It isn’t required for combat, though, because there is none!

The web is fun to use, but it can also be a little frustrating when it doesn’t stick to the right thing. You will also use the web to move items which can become quite tedious. Fling web after web to weigh down a platform or move an item into place. Sometimes there was so much web! I actually looked up a guide to find out whether I was just missing something. Could this really be the intended way to solve the puzzle? And yes, yes it is.

Aside from that issue, using the web was a great experience. Swinging through the sky and flinging web at branches or rocks to keep momentum was so much fun, and I really enjoyed the freedom the web provides. It was also my first experience swinging through the sky while 30 wolf spider babies hitched a ride.

Art and sound

Webbed has a cute pixel art style, filled with vibrant environments. The colour palette gives a true sense of nature with various earthy tones in the ant nest and bright, vibrant greens up in the tree canopy. The character design is cute, though it does feel true to nature with colouring and detail.

The soundtrack is upbeat and full of adventure, with different themes for each environment. It is an excellent accompaniment to the game. I enjoyed the sound effects, especially the sound of the web. It changed tone depending on how many webs you had and how taut they were. It was a lovely detail that made me smile.

Final thoughts

Webbed is a great combat-free platformer! It’s always awesome to see the genre growing with games that centre on platforming rather than violence. Webbed has a great sense of freedom as you swing around on your web, and it just feels nice to play.

The story is pretty basic and doesn’t go much further than ‘I need to save my boyfriend’, but it has enough to keep you going with the cute bugs and gorgeous environments—a definite must-try for lovers of platformers.

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Platforms: PC (Steam, Humble & Gog)
Genre: 2D platformer, puzzle platformer, adventure