Gravity Ghost imagines the maelstrom of adolescence further complicated by its protagonist's untimely death. As an elliptic platformer, it's concerned with reaching a neat-and-tidy series of goals. As a narrative experience, it's consumed by normalizing the despondency of its cast. Gravity Ghost's kinetic novelty may have ebbed since its 2015 debut, but its resolution, which seeks idyllic healing from an enormous tragedy, still creates a powerful statement.
Gravity Ghost’s sense of movement serves as a mesmerizing introduction. Hopping its protagonist, Iona, from one 2D planetoid to another and feeling the pull of gravity between the densely-packed surfaces is akin to playing with two magnets in your hands. On a primal level, it’s just fun to test the magic physics that manipulate reality. Super Mario Galaxy made the same bet and interpreted “physics-based platformer” differently from peers reliant on more literal systems. Gravity Ghost may operate on smaller scale, but it’s no less of a joy to play with and engage.
Over one hundred levels operate on the same principle: find and touch star to unlock the exit door. Early on this is performed by finding the rhythm between multiple planetoids and negotiating a jump that will swing Iona into the path of a star. With significant velocity, Iona can crash into smaller, clear planets and remove their gravity from the level’s equation. It’s a tricky process, but your brain slowly acclimates to Gravity Ghost’s operation. In almost no time you’ll go from an impossible mess to a slingshotting professional.
Complications arrive when planetoids begin to assume different properties. Iona can pass right through water planetoids and bounce off rubbery planetoids. With each series of levels come additional elemental powers and properties, allowing Iona to encircle the planetoid and shift its element. This task doesn’t come into play too often—it’s a lot of stars hiding inside of planets—but it creates more of a possibility space inside of Gravity Ghost’s set of challenges.
An increase in difficulty is matched with additional mechanics. Iona can acquire different abilities that almost feel like cheats for Gravity Ghost’s physics system. Iona can double-down on her weight and sink to the nearest pull of gravity. A double jump, a dash, weightless movement, and complete translucence can all help acquire otherwise difficult stars. I don’t know if any of these are ever required—it feels like someone who is good enough at Gravity Ghost may never use them—but they’re a wonderful helper for more demanding stars.
Collectibles extend in every direction. Most present are geoms, which are colorful bobbles Iona can collect to extend the length of her planet-transforming hair. Most relevant to the story are the bones of animals, which must be reunited with ghostly animals swinging around (and mirroring Iona’s movement) in other, nearby levels. It’s fairly central to Gravity Ghost’s story to nab all of those animals, but geoms felt largely optional. I easily finished all of Gravity Ghost’s original levels by only collecting what was in my main path.
Gravity Ghost is an accessible game. The single-screen levels are often bite sized, and it’s possible to make it to the star and back to the door in under a minute. This is great! The quantity of levels and the diversity of themes—Gravity Ghost cites everything from pinball to Melancholia—have a singular focus on brevity. Solving each constellation’s closing Guardian challenge and a trio of timed sequences demand a bit more foresight and planning, but nothing felt insurmountable. Cruising through in around three hours, I never felt tired or disinterested.
While Gravity Ghost’s platforming is competent, its accompanying narrative is profound. Iona, who is twelve years old, lives on a rural island in the 40’s where her family maintains a lighthouse. Tragedy strikes when her parents suddenly pass away. Turmoil ensues as her Hickory, Iona’s elder sister, assumes the responsibility of Iona and her other two sisters. What follows is a wistful, heartfelt narrative on alienation, abandonment, and isolation on top of the most difficult time in Iona’s life. The magic of adolescence, when perspective expands and worldviews begin to shift, is complicated by a haze of depression and despondence. The island and its cast of characters seek to help Iona understand her new world.
Iona’s dead, though. Gravity Ghost’s is premised on Iona’s existence after she passes away. How she chooses to interact with the world she’s left behind shapes her development as a person, even in the afterlife. Gravity Ghost also has a deep relationship with the island’s wildlife, specifically a friendly fox named Voy. Iona and Hickory’s connection to Voy forms Gravity Ghost’s moral center and carries the power to pull an emotional response out of the player. While I maintain a personal weakness for any kind of fiction in which children befriend animals and Bad Stuff happens, Gravity Ghost’s force is enough to connect with anyone’s weeping heart. I’ve never died, obviously, but I know what unrecoverable loss feels like and Gravity Ghost recalls those thoughts and emotions.
This is kind of a weird thing to pull out of a candy-colored platformer! The juxtaposition is effective, however, because of how it presents Iona’s journey alongside the present circumstance of the island. Over the course of Gravity Ghost the player will mend Iona’s relationship with nature, shape hubris into forgiveness, and recognize that a childlike view of the world may interpret and respond to loss differently than an adult mind. Innocence isn’t incompatible with growth, even after the end of existence. After dealing with Braid’s self-important gobbledygook or Katana Zero’s edge-lording arrogance, it’s nice to relax into Gravity Ghost’s honest and resonant dive into a tethered fairy tale.
The PlayStation 4 version of Gravity Ghost, released as Gravity Ghost: Deluxe Edition, features some new content. Most prominent are thirteen bonus levels accessed through a strand to a new constellation on the world map. I only finished one and couldn’t figure out how to get enough momentum to grab the highly-placed star on the second one. This is personally embarrassing as a person who 100%’d Super Meat Boy. I’m sorry! In any case these rainbow-flavored levels arrive with brand new tunes from Ben Pruty, too.
Gravity Ghost originally released on PC in 2015. I reviewed it four years ago with a collection of expensive adjectives that I now find awkward. The sentiment, however, remains the same. Gravity Ghost’s existential crisis works across time. I am a different person than I was four years ago but Gravity Ghost, re-telling me a tale I had all but forgotten, made the same connection.
Gravity Ghost imagines the maelstrom of adolescence further complicated by its protagonist’s untimely death. As an elliptic platformer, it’s concerned with reaching a neat-and-tidy series of goals. As a narrative experience, it’s consumed by normalizing the despondency of its cast. Gravity Ghost’s kinetic novelty may have ebbed since its 2015 debut, but its resolution, which seeks idyllic healing from an enormous tragedy, still creates a powerful statement.
