After exiting the tutorial cave I was almost immediately overwhelmed by there being so much stuff to look at and almost no way to make sense of it all. The text box shadowing isn't strong enough so any special terms that get written in non-white are actually harder to read than the normal text. There's signs marking the paths within the village, but they're just "magic rune" font (like in a zelda) and you can't click them to read what they actually say (the opposite of a zelda). If there had been like, little markers on the map of where to go I probably could have muddled through, but with no guidance at all I think this one isn't for me.

A gentle walking (flying?) sim. We play as Auk, a shapeshifter who can take a bird form, who lives in a world of shattered, floating islands. She undertakes a pilgrimage across the sky to find ancient temples in order to find a way of pushing back an encroaching dark force. Most of the gameplay is wrapped up in flying around and enjoying the sights, with some extremely light puzzle solving in the temples themselves. Lovely low-poly visuals and great aesthetic design are the main draws here as the narrative is very understated and the gameplay has no real challenges to speak of.

It's very easy to impress me with games similar to GRIS and JOURNEY, but I just wasn't a fan of this one. This has way more gameplay than the game it took all of its inspiration from, but sadly most of it feels extremely dull. The "lore" and the atmosphere didn't do much for me either, and while it was never frustrating to play, I felt absolutely nothing at all while playing this. But despite all of this, I do think that the team that worked on this has the potential to drop an absolute banger and I would love to see a new, polished game from them that's similar to AER.

In AER: Memories of Old, you play as Auk, a pilgrim from the People of the Sky, who can shift into the form of a bird through her Spirit Animal (please note this is the term the game uses). Auk explores the world as it is now, learning about the past and the Great Divide.

This game is more of a guided exploration with the occasional puzzle/platforming experience rather than a game in either of these genres. I've seen many people call this a walking sim, and I'd agree - if that doesn't appeal to you, this isn't the game for you!

I played this on the Nintendo Switch, and the controls worked well. However, I did have some trouble with the graphics and cut scenes which ended up freezing and jumping around a little - so not ideal.