I got this free on the Epic game store a while back and finally decided to give it a shot. I'm still early, but I think I might have accidentally boned myself by leaving an area before I was meant to and now I can't get back.

Given that this game is 5 years old I'm not sure how much people are going to remember, but I figure it's worth asking.

So here's the problem:

For some reason (I really don't remember why!), after beating the boss in Absu, I didn't finish exploring the area before I left, and now I can't find an accessible route back to it.

In the first screen shot below, the red arrow is where I need to get back to, and as far as I can tell the only way to get there is via the bottom route where the yellow arrow is. The problem is, access to the vertical room that leads to that lower path (my current position in the screenshot) is blocked - the pink energy barrier things are up on both sides and I don't have a way to hit the switches (see second screenshot). I feel like this might be what's gone wrong. Should both of those barriers still be up if I already went through that room? (Also, for anyone wondering, that exit at the top that I haven't taken yet is inaccessible from the left due to a glitched out wall that I can't pass (see third screenshot)

Either I'm missing something, or I've managed to break it somehow and I'm SOL. It hasn't really grabbed me so far anyway, I just wanted to give it a bit longer because people say it gets good later on. But if this is going to require starting over to fix I'm just going to skip it and move onto something else.

You should have picked up the Address Disrupter from a room near where you fought the boss. That lets you get past the glitched wall.

@therealturk: I have that but it doesn't seem to have any effect on that particular wall.

I have no specific advice, but I'm pretty sure Axiom Verge doesn't easily break. Your scenario is the kind of thing that is commonly checked during playtesting (exiting an area "early" instead of taking the intended path "forward"). Sometimes these bugs persist to release, but in the modern era those progression bugs almost certainly get patched out (except on some awkward Wii games that had no patch process and you had to send your save to Nintendo in the mail).

It's been way too long for me to remember your area specifically. I'd recommend just reading a guide, or watching a video playthrough, and try to minimize spoilers and see how that player progress at the point you are at in the game (or ctrl+f to the next time that area is mentioned, and see how they re-enter that area and hope it isn't a spoiler). I really, really doubt you have to start over. I remember thinking I must be stuck once or twice in Axiom Verge, but there's usually just a less obvious thing you have to do.

I feel like a well-aimed blast from that electricity shotgun weapon that you get fairly early on could hit that one red bulb and you'd be out of there.

Also I played this game at launch and haven't made more than half-hearted thirty-minute tries at finishing it since. It's interesting enough to be excited for the sequel but the original maybe has more kinks than I'd like. Boring environments, sometimes-annoying music, and a seriously annoying control issue where I keep accidentally dashing when there was a perfectly reasonable shoulder button that could have been used. That shoulder button's eventual function could have been assigned to the weapon wheel.

That was it! Thank you!

I had only played it for about 2 hours before switching to another game for a few days and then coming back to it after (which apparently was enough time for me to forget some important stuff!)

Glad you found the fix. I found the map design of the game to be frustratingly linear and far too open and vague, both at once. There's almost no way to meaningfully backtrack for 75% of the game and it feels almost like a prescribed set of corridors you're being guided down, and then it blows wide open and gives you more options and routes than you know what to do with. I loved the lore and the story and did a deep dive after on that stuff, but the game itself is very eh.

You're welcome!

I actually remembered it because Super Metroid is largely burned into my memory and the Wave Beam is used to get through some shutters with locks on the other side. They are pretty much the same in concept as the place where you were stuck. I'm not sure if Thomas Happ would be thrilled about that or not.