MeMic is an atmospheric stealth game both developed and published by OnlineKingdom, where you play as a Mimic. Slink amongst the common rabble that is pesky adventurers as you do what mimics do best- kill anyone who gets close enough for you to wrap your grubby black tendrils around. While this may in fact be just about every TTRPG fans wildest dreams come true (and I sure as heck know it was one of mine), I was really curious on how things would be carried out, from both a game play and graphical perspective. Executing such concept might seem relatively simplistic- but I feel like with some preconceived notions, there may be a large variance of expectation. Needless to say, I set off with high hopes of devouring adventurers non-stop, by way of classic execution via treasure chest, or some other method. Let’s hope OnlineKingdom doesn’t disappoint.

Hit Q to see the wide choice of hiding spots you have to choose from.

 Off the bat, the art style, while minimalist, has it’s own quirks and charm that absolutely lend to the atmosphere. While I was initially a little bit skeptical, it grew on me over time. Using bright bold colors against a fairly gray pallet really tended to liven up the space, as well as make it usually more obvious what objects you could potentially “meld” with. Across the five available levels, while generally reading as a “castle”, all of them do stand out, having unique flavour. While one is quite “generic castle”, another screams “dungeons and crypts”, “loads of treasure”, or “arcane study”. Overall, there is a decent amount of variance amongst the maps, which I can appreciate. Some are also surprisingly vast for what it may initially appear, finding yourself turned around backwards and on your backside. Overall, I had no real disappointment in the graphical choices, or the locations. Unfortunately, and sadly to say, that is exactly the point at which my high hopes came crumbling down… and the dismay at the rest of the game crept in.

One of the 5 starting areas, most of which are entirely castle coded- with some obvious variance in theme.

Controls, while simplistic, were one of the first things that somewhat pointed to some dissatisfaction for me. Movement is, as one would expect, WASD for your basic movement. Sadly, there was no shift to sprint, or space bar to jump. I will give credit that Q handily highlighted all available objects you could “disguise” yourself as, and E was used as your core interaction button to morph into and out of objects. F is used to make an end of the drifting adventurers that serve as your only targets… ending them when they least expect it. Sadly, this was far less rewarding than I had hoped. Due to the remaining controls, lack of maneuverability to kill adventurers, and lack of visual appeal on execution- it really began to fall flat long before the first level even game to a close.

While utterly generic in some ways, this treasure room is nearly so cliche, that it's delightful. 

While some of the additional abilities were useful (your 1, 2, and 3abilities) 1 being a cloud of mist that allows for a hasty exit when needed, 2 being a “scent tracker” that allows you a directional look of where adventurers are… but 3, while useful in theory, was executed poorly. Your third ability allows you to “toss a coin”. And while one might think this could lend to a multi-faucted approach, it falls horrendously flat in more ways than one. For myself, I never even “saw” a coin animation. There is no real way to know where the coin is tossed, or landed, and the sound effect rarely would execute- leaving the only way I knew it had possibly gone off, was once the cool-down that is visible on the “hot bar” started. Not only that, but instead of causing a distraction or potentially guiding the adventurer into position, nearly every time it merely alerted my prey to my EXACT location, ending in my certain demise.

Sadly, one of it's glaring AI issues is how often adventurers will get caught on stairs- an annoyingly persistent problem across all levels.

 Ultimately, while the concept of MeMic is fantastic, it’s lack of things like multiplayer features and extreme shortness are a horrible drawback. What should be a thrilling game of hunt and chase is realistically a slow crawl, plucking off adventurers in agonizingly sloggish succession, while not being afforded much in the way of mobility or any real tactical advantage. Sadly, this is a game that shows a heap of promise, lost to poor execution- though that could easily be chocked up to just lacking the means or the budget to do so. I would love to see the development team really make something out of this title, but at the moment I might sit and wait this one out, with hope of future plans.

MeMic is currently available on the Steam Marketplace for $7.99 USD.