Pepper Grinder is a neat little game, but I can’t help but feel a little conflicted. It’s Short. Very Short. Four worlds, six or so levels per world, then a boss fight. There’s a shop, but no real upgrades to buy, just some basic palette-swap skins, stickers, and temp health. But to balance that, the game was made by a solo developer. Yes, Balatro is also a solo developer indie game, but everybody’s got to run their own race.

Mechanically it’s pretty good, you have one core mechanic of a big drill with which you will pierce the heavens, and you hold right trigger to BRRRRR and drill your way through dirt, enemies, giant skulls, etc. There are a couple other mechanics like grappling hooks and giant robots, but the drill is all you’ll really be using. You’ll be holding right trigger for upwards of 90% of your play time.

Drilling is, as stated, pretty good… until it isn’t. There are some bits where it gets super frustrating because you know what you need to do, but execution requires a much bigger brain and significantly less-stupid fingers than the ones I am equipped with. Unlike many other modern indie platformers like Celeste there aren’t a ton of accessibility options. You can slow the game down and turn screen shake on or off, and that’s about it. Yes, slowing the game down does make the timing of some of the jumps significantly easier, but it also means if you beef a dash you get to watch your little driller gracefully sail off the map into a pit in slow motion.

Difficulty tuning is also a bit all over the place. Levels are a fair challenge, but some of the bosses are an absolute pain, mostly due to having way too much health compared to how much damage your drill does.

Overall the game is pretty great. It’ll be wonderful as part of a Humble Bundle, or Steam Sale, or Game Pass should it ever be ported to Xbox, but it’s not something I’d consider an absolute must-buy experience.