Niche Gamer Plays is an ongoing video preview series where our staff take an in-depth and yet concise look at classic, current, and upcoming games across all current gaming platforms.

For this episode, I booted up Sabotage Studio and publisher Devolver Digital’s darling indie action-platformer, The Messenger.

This episode of Niche Gamer Plays is actually done under our newish “Papa Orselli Chill Stream” series, a stream that yours truly hosts every Monday night.

Here’s a rundown on the game, via its Steam page:

As a demon army besieges his village, a young ninja ventures through a cursed world, to deliver a scroll paramount to his clan’s survival.

Leveraging players expectations as a core game design ingredient, The Messenger is first presented as an 8-bit action platformer with a simple story, that unravels into an epic time traveling tale, eventually revealing itself as a 16-bit Metroidvania game packed with replay value and deadpan humor.

Key Features:

• An epic ninja adventure with challenging gameplay and tight controls.
• Legit 8-bit and 16-bit art and music reminiscent of your favorite NES and SNES games.
• Memorable cast of (often silly) villains, bosses and associates.
• Catchy soundtrack by renowned chiptune composer Rainbowdragoneyes, made in Famitracker.
• Character upgrades, new abilities, hidden levels and story arcs to discover.
• Challenging and visceral gameplay where mastery is a thing to behold.

The Messenger is currently available for Windows PC and Nintendo Switch. Expect our thorough review for the game shortly.