Thanks to a pretty stacked videogame release calendar, I haven't had the opportunity to check out as many smaller games as I would've perhaps liked to. But despite my busy schedule, there's one thing I always have time for: minigames.
One of the most influential games of my childhood, and perhaps my favourite Nintendo DS game of all time, was Super Mario 64. Not because of its platforming or story—instead, it was the minigames that kept me coming back. I can still see the screen for minigames like Hide and Boo Seek and Sort or 'Splode because I played them so often over the years. But now my DS Lite is hanging on by a thread, and I've had to turn my attention elsewhere.
Luckily, one of my friends pointed me in the direction of Mindwave, a story-driven take on games like WarioWare, which is basically just a ton of minigames smushed together. The story starts with a young girl called Pandora who decides to enter a game show alongside thousands of other contestants in the Mindscape Tower. The aim is to get to the top of the tower but to do that, you need to beat levels of minigames and bosses, all of which take some kind of inspiration from the thoughts and minds of the other contestants.
Before I started the first section of minigames, I decided to chat with some of these other contestants to see whether getting to know them would give me a leg up in their minigames. I talked to a pair of friends who had joined together about their favourite TV shows and pastimes, and I made small talk for a bit with a random guy who insisted on showing me his mixtape before the games started. While it was cool getting to know them, I'm not sure that it actually made any difference when it came to competing in the games, but these conversations may prove more useful later on. After I was done chatting with a couple of contestants, I decided that I couldn't wait any longer, so off I went.
Some of the minigames in the first round include catching a runaway cat by just grabbing it as quickly as possible, beating someone in Tetris, avoiding kiss attacks, typing as much jargon as possible, and matching some Sailor Moon poses. I love how random and creative each one is, and the music that accompanies them ties it all together brilliantly. The song is definitely a girly pop anthem, which is great, but the rhythm also gives you a hand by lining up with some of the minigames.
Despite having a ton of fun sifting through the options, I was utterly overwhelmed by some of them. There's not a ton of time to complete each one, and with only a one-word prompt to tell you what to do, you need to be pretty alert the entire time. After a couple of practice rounds, the minigames all became slightly more straightforward, and messing up isn't a massive deal as you have four lives to fall back on. Unfortunately, the only part that I had a real issue with was right at the end when I went up against the section boss.
This first boss wasn't some Dark Souls-looking monster or even someone with a weapon at all. Instead, it's just a more difficult minigame that often takes more time to complete. The one I came up against was a pretty classic timed platforming challenge where I needed to jump up platforms to escape a rising, toxic liquid.
That may sound easy enough, but I just couldn't get to the top, no matter how hard I tried. I'm not sure if it was the pressure that got to me or whether you can't control when you jump, but you still need to time it right so you jump higher than normal to reach the next ledge. Whatever the reason was, I just couldn't hack it. And every time I failed, I had to start over with a new gauntlet of minigames. On the bright side, I'm now incredibly well-versed in all the little minigames that come before the boss.
Despite being no good at jumping, I had a ton of fun with Mindwave. It lists its release date as January 15, 2025, on Steam, but it looks like this was just for the release of the demo and the Kickstarter—there are no further details about when players can expect to play the full version. But I'm happy to wait however long it takes. I feel like the demo only scratched the surface of what else is in store for players who venture into the Mindscape Tower, which only makes me more excited for when it releases in full.
