Mixing things up a little this week by extending this feature beyond a single title, instead looking at the three games from small Indie developer Siactro that are currently available to buy on Steam and Itch (I was fortunate enough to grab all three in the semi-recent Ukraine Aid Itch bundle). All retro throwbacks, though to the comparatively less-explored late-'90s/32-bit era, we have Macbat 64, Toree 3D, and Toree 2. None of these games are particularly substantial in size - hence why I'm covering all three in one blog - but are at least adept at invoking the aesthetic and gameplay of their chosen source material. I'm always a sucker for any game that can teleport me back to those halcyon days of polygonal graphics, back when your imagination had to do quite a lot of the heavy lifting, and a keen appreciation of the excitement and experimentation that surrounded the tech.

We'll start with the earliest of the three: Macbat 64, first released in 2017. It's immediately evident where the inspiration for Macbat 64 comes from as various characters - distinguished from random background objects by a pair of cartoonish eyes that reliably represent some degree of sapience - fill a bright and colorful world of collectible tchotchkes, traversable platforms, and simple environmental puzzles. All it lacks is a sarcastic bird in your backpack, insulting everyone on your behalf. Due to limitations, the game is scaled-down to hitting a few notable beats with its diorama-like levels in lieu of offering massive worlds to explore, significant challenges, or even enemies to fight; rather, each of its levels is presented as a puzzle wherein you have to complete a series of objectives or find certain items that eventually lead to one of the six keys that open the way to the "Watery Factory," the world's only fresh water supply, to resolve whatever blockage is causing a worldwide draught. Each of these levels has a familiar theme or is otherwise riffing on specific games - there's a haunted house with keys to find, a Banjo-Kazooie beach with treasure chests scattered throughout, and a Donkey Kong 64 jungle featuring the only NPC with VA dialogue (Grant Kirkhope himself, dropping by to voice an ape) - and they draw from a wide range of N64 highlights, including a kart racer course.

To reiterate, none of these worlds are super elaborate in their construction or via the obstacles and challenges placed in your path, but they do offer a small variety of objectives to accomplish. There's also some post-game bonus levels that the developer tinkered around with before choosing to keep out the core product, a couple of which are actually kinda terrifying - I'm not sure if the dev is involved with the Dread X crowd, but survival horror wasn't something you saw on N64 outside of that one Resident Evil 2 port and maybe tangential cases like Doom 64 or Castlevania - and another that gives you a power-up that lets you break the boundaries of the other levels and go exploring in the dead zone, for those budding designers and engineers curious enough about how the sausage is made that they're willing to break the game's immersion to go "noclipping" around the geometry.

In some ways, Macbat 64's almost exhibition-like approach to reenacting the highs of Rare's 3D platformer era recalls that Bubsy 3D art installation parody, or the equally bizarre Sonic Dreams Collection, only played straight with the material: there's a few in-jokes and references dropped here and there, but for the most part you're playing through a recognizable spin on certain N64 games that have been greatly pared down to resemble a breezy and brief exploration game with a few mini-games. As a two-hour long nostalgia rush bought for pennies (or for free in my case) it's cute and disarming, while still a far cry from other, more substantial Indie attempts at 3D collectathon platformers like A Hat in Time or Yooka-Laylee (both also released in 2017).

On the other hand, Toree 3D and Toree 2 (both released in 2021) feel like more complete game experiences but are also, conversely, a little less compelling due to their laser focus. Featuring a cute chick (the bird kind) with shades, the goal of every one of its levels is to dash to the end of a linear platforming course while grabbing star collectibles, avoiding enemies and hazards, and running and jumping through zippers. With each finished level, your completion time and number of collectibles are logged - either of which will eventually unlock a new character to use - and you become one step closer to unlocking the final level. The first eight levels are all available to play from the outset, though it's usually best to go through them in the order presented: there's a steady ramp up in difficulty, as the game goes from simple obstacle courses to jumping between moving trucks or negotiating narrow icy pathways. Both Toree games play identically: the sequel feels like expanded content if anything, albeit with a handful of small improvements. (For instance, dying in Toree 2 will reset you to the last checkpoint while also resetting the timer to whatever it was when you activated said checkpoint; with this feature, you can keep trying to complete the same stretch of the course as close to perfect as possible before hitting the next one.)

The aesthetic of the Toree games is definitely closer to the overstimulating day-glo arcade-y sensibility that was very prominent on the Sega Dreamcast, and to a lesser extent the Sony PlayStation, than the whimsical UK-borne N64 Rare games. The time trials and grading score system are akin to something like NiGHTs into Dreams or maybe a DDR, while the BGM sounds like it was pulled out of a Sonic Adventure sequel that never was. (Incidentally, the era-imitating soundtracks to all three games are highlights and worth seeking out. I enjoyed this Sonic R-ass peppy R&B ballad from Toree 2 in particular.) Like Macbat 64, there's also a certain sinister horror element lying just beneath the otherwise cute visuals. Neither of the Toree games will take more than a hour tops unless you're the type to keep improving your course times to sneak ever closer to the elusive A-ranks, which is about the perfect length for the type of game experience it offers.

These three games do a fine job crystallizing the essence of what the gaming scene was like at the turn of the millennium by nailing the look and feel, if not really aiming to be worthy challengers to the gaming paragons from that time. It seems like the developer is passionate about revisiting what made gaming of the late '90s so memorable - much like Wadjet Eye does for the point-and-click adventures from that decade - and is improving their craft with each new project, so I wish them well that they'll pull out a genuine contender for the Rare 3D platformer and/or Sega arcade platformer at some future point in their career. In the meantime, there's always a niche for these cheap and cheerful curiosities capable of eliciting a few smiles and fondly recalled memories.

Rating: 3 out of 5. (For all three.)