If you were going to describe Nihilumbra in very nuts-and-bolts terms, writing the blurb for an App Store entry perhaps, you might say something like: "Nihilumbra is a side-scrolling platform adventure featuring unique gameplay elements, gorgeous graphics and a catchy soundtrack."
It would be a worthless description, because Nihilumbra isn't really about tricky jumpy, making frantic and daring escapes from enemies, or anything else you've been led to expect from the genre. It's about immersing yourself into a world that's confusing, beautiful, a little too grandiose in its storytelling, but ultimately mesmerizing. You are a blob. You escape an undefined void, and you travel through the surface of the world assuming the forms of objects you encounter, while the black tendrils of the void occasionally reach out to pull you back into the darkness.
There is a story to the game, and it's told in cryptic references to your origins, that void you were born in and now run from, the worthlessness of your retreat into the upper world's mountains, forests and snow-stormed valleys, and the assurances that your tiny form will ultimately return to the darkness. All you can do as the story unfolds is make the progress it allows you, jumping over gaps, solving basic platform challenges, and avoiding the meager offering of enemies whose slightest touch will send you back to the void.
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