Completely Stretchy
Review
Don't Stretch Yourself Too Thin
by Camrin Santchi
reviewed on PC
An Eclectic World
The world of Completely Stretchy is an odd one from the start, with garish colors and simple designs for the characters. You start off late to work, where you help an old professor run an experiment on the power source for the Gumbli Isles, small creatures called Elektros. The experiment goes wrong and the Elektros are scattered through the Gumbli Isles, and your character is completely coated in a blue liquid called 'Bloop', which turns you, as the name of the game implies, Completely Stretchy. You're tasked with gathering up all of the Elektros to restore power, and gathering more Bloop to enhance your stretchiness in order to accomplish that goal.
Lots To Do
In true video game fashion the inhabitants of the three Grumbli Isles within Completely Stretchy aren’t just going to hand over the Elektros even though many complain in idle dialogue about the power outage, and that you seem to be the only person that can touch them without being zapped. You can find some via exploring, but you’ll also receive a lot of them from completing side quests- from hoverbike races to delivering packages without touching the ground. Once you get enough on the first island which is a primarily urban setting, you’ll acquire access to the other two, an industrial and natural setting respectively. Each island has its own quests and collectibles, with some overarching ones that stretch to all three- finding lost books is one of the largest quests in this regard, since the library is in the urban setting but the books are found on all three islands.
Swinging Through The Sky
Completely Stretchy has some pretty fun movement to it, especially once you collect some additional Bloop to increase the length of your stretchy arm and the stickiness, which means the amount of 'sticks' you can chain together before you have to hit the ground for a brief moment before restoring them. It does take some getting used to, but it doesn't take long at all before you can start to sling yourself around the islands at high speeds. This is necessary to accomplish the parkour courses that reward you with Elektros, but it also helps passively by allowing you to get to other quests faster and more easily. As a fan of Spider-Man, this reviewer appreciates a game that allows a player to manoeuvre at high speeds to emulate the wall-crawler, so that itself is pretty great!
Getting Caught In The Gears
Completely Stretchy is a very finicky game, and unfortunately has a lot of jank to it - I actually ended up getting soft-locked from one of the quests, seemingly one of the major ones to acquire an item that furthers progression. This occurred due to the game not really liking when the player character is moved by objects besides their stretchy arm, so became glitched outside of an elevator as it lowered down, There was a button up above to call the elevator, but it didn't appear to work. I went back a few times after the fact to see if it resolved itself, and even tried glitching back into place to try continuing the quest, but unfortunately there wasn't any luck. The only solution within Completely Stretchy would probably be to start a new save file. The game is short at least, so there's that, but losing progress is frustrating, even in a short game. If the softlock were fixed somehow, then it would be much easier to recommend Completely Stretchy, but as the game currently stands, it is enjoyable but rather flawed.
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5.7
fun score
Pros
Fun movement, Short and enjoyable, Catchy but simple music
Cons
Buggy, Janky, Soft Locks
