Some games win you over with a trailer, others with an idea: a Siamese cat, his mech and a floating whale-shaped city that does not always play by its own rules. Bolt of Whalington, a metroidvania by Orca Studio, a three-person team from Melbourne, published by UltraPlayers, got a free Steam demo on Thursday (5). The full game is due in 2027, on PC only.
What is in the demo
The demo opens four areas of Whalington: Sardine, Kitchen, Cabins and Residence, with the complete Kitchen area and portions of the other three. The studio estimates 60 to 90 minutes on the main path, or up to 2.5 hours for players who chase every secret. One honest warning from the announcement itself: the trailer and the introduction feature content from the full game that is not in the demo.
Terminals that rewrite the world
What stands out is the central mechanic. At “Rule Terminals” scattered around the city, players can hack certain rules of the world: turn the cat into a rat, transform HP into keys or discover entirely new ways to interact with the environment. And that is only one of the surprises: there are gravity-defying environments where walls become paths, platforms that react to light, and each region introduces its own ideas rather than repeating the same tricks.
A nice touch: ordinary objects rarely do only what they seem to. A solid-looking wall may give way to a little soap; a sealed room may have another way in. The studio gives the example of a catnip can hanging just out of reach: one player might launch Bolt from his mech at the peak of a jump, another might use shotgun recoil to gain extra height, and neither is the only solution. Cat and mech exist in the world at the same time, so you can switch between them and combine their abilities.
“We wanted Bolt of Whalington to feel like a world you can poke at, with a cat, a mech and a floating whale-city full of things that don’t always behave the way you expect,” said Josh, founder and producer at Orca Studio. Harry, publishing director at UltraPlayers, added: “When two players can reach the same goal in different ways, exploration starts to feel more personal and surprising.” Bosses have their own patterns, but a passing NPC remark, a forgotten scroll or an item description might reveal an enemy’s weakness.
The founder’s declared inspiration is Hayao Miyazaki’s Howl’s Moving Castle, and the goal is to make exploration itself the reward, with humour and “eureka” moments instead of punishing difficulty. The demo is on the game’s Steam page. Fans of the genre can also check out our interview about Voivod: The Nuclear Warrior and the EVIL MOON: Unspoken demo.
Where to buy
See also our monthly game release calendar.
Source: Orca Studio and UltraPlayers.
Max Xavier