Between February and March 2022, solo developer Jack Breen launched the Kickstarter campaign for an ambitious pixel art action platformer, GIGASWORD. With the project seeing great success by the end of its month-long run—thanks to the game’s strikingly creative premise and slew of exciting inspirations—GIGASWORD managed to fund $46,122 from a total of 1,047 passionate backers. As development ramped up after the campaign’s massive success, news from the game’s director died down slightly; however, approaching its release date, more information has since come to light. Initially planned for an October 2 release, it was announced in mid-September that a delay of the game to November 13 would be necessary as plans shifted to incorporate console versions of the game; likely thanks to the project being picked up by the popular publisher behind Videocult’s Rain World, Akupara Games.

GIGASWORD is a retro-inspired action-puzzle metroidvania set in an expansive fantasy wooded dark tower, dungeon setting heavily reminiscent of the game’s primary inspiration, detailed on its Kickstarter page: Yacht Club’s Shovel Knight. With an eerily similar chiptune soundfont and pixel art woodland scenery of a tower in the distance, early screenshots shared on the game’s Kickstarter make GIGASWORD truly feel like an overt homage to Shovel Knight. That being said, similar to the brilliance of Shovel Knight’s level design for each of its different playable characters, GIGASWORD’s gameplay is like no other in its genre. Gameplay sees players take on the role of Ezra, the wielder of the hulking GIGASWORD, as he embarks on a journey that leads him into a dark tower off in the distance in search of “The God Crystal” Gnosis. This sword is like no other due to the game’s realistic treatment of its size and weight as hindrances for the player to overcome. Players will, at times, be forced to leave it behind to lighten the load, as you will soon realize Ezra is unable to do certain basic abilities—such as climbing up ladders or jumping up to high places—due to the sheer burden of carrying it. The design concept behind the GIGASWORD is enough to draw in several different kinds of gamers, as the sheer weight of your weapon effectively drags you down despite its unmatched usefulness in combat, leading to interesting puzzle designs and solutions that involve separating the player character from their most valuable tool.

While GIGASWORD was initially intended for release to PC only as of October 2, the game was given a much-needed delay of just a few months to ensure the correct amount of polish went into the final product, not to mention also to ensure the day 1 release of console ports. Gamers can get their hands on a demo of GIGASWORD for free on PC via Steam; however, the game was also officially released worldwide just this past November 13 to Nintendo Switch, PlayStation, and Xbox, and PC via Steam.