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I wish I could tell you which decision I was avoiding when I started playing Fotonica, but it's long gone, lost to the Vectrex light trails and the heavy pumping of unseen feet. Santa Ragione's one-button sprint is something of a shock at first, and the really big surprise comes from how tactile, how punishingly physical, this seemingly abstract game feels.Maybe it's the hands - wire-framed blades of Neuromancer flesh that swing up and down as you run. Maybe it's the audio, with that suggestion of panting, of winded landings lurking beneath the buzzing, sliding soundtrack. Whatever it is, it lifts the game out of the confines of its endless runner formula. Or maybe it elevates the entire formula, giving a human weight to a game in which you hold down a button - any button - to build up speed, and release it to jump.
Aha! And you also press the button again to bring you down out of your jump, adding an element of target practice to proceedings as you shift from one rail to another, avoiding drops, moving up and down through stacked tiers of tracks, and collecting funny little pink spheres that probably count towards something but are so delightful to land on that you'd aim for them regardless.
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