Swapshot from eastasiasoft and Naoka Games is a 2D action puzzle game in which you use a teleportation gun. Check our Swapshot review!

Get ready for an intense platforming adventure with the bravest little girl of them all! In Swapshot, you take control of this fearless heroine equipped with a teleportation gun. Your mission is to overcome a series of challenges in a 2D world filled with brainteasing puzzles. Explore 35 meticulously designed levels, full of treacherous spikes and cunning traps, using your gun to hit teleportation boxes and instantly swap positions with them, opening up a world of strategic possibilities.

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Swapshot from eastasiasoft and Naoka Games is a minimalistic action puzzle game in which your goal will simply be to reach the end of each single-screen level by using a teleportation gun. There is no story or context for this, which makes this one feel like an old-school arcade game experience. The first few levels will act as a basic tutorial. I’m not a fan when games hold your hands for very basic stuff, and fortunately, Swapshot doesn’t force you to read text as the instructions are simple popups telling you which button you need to press. Once you’ve learned the basics, it’ll be up to you to find out the solution for each stage.

The controls are very easy to use. The left analog stick moves your character, and the X button will be for jumping. After jumping, you do have some control over your jump so that you can adjust where you’ll land, which I liked. You can jump farther if you’re moving at the same time. The jump button felt capricious and sometimes won’t activate if you’re too close to a ledge, which will frustratingly bring you back to the beginning of the level as you’ll likely die or end up making a mistake. Later, you’ll be introduced to the teleportation gun, which can swap your position with a crate once you shoot with the R1 button and hit one.

On the level design side, this one felt uninspired. The levels all use the same texture style, and all have the same elements: platforms, crates, spikes, and buttons. This became redundant in the end, and I would have liked to have a bit more variety. Swapshot focuses on the puzzle elements and looks like it forgot to take the presentation into account. In short, the level design isn’t groundbreaking but gets the job done. As you can see from the screenshots, the game’s presentation is monotonous. Once you’ve seen the first level, you likely have seen most of them since there’s a single-tile set. And it’s the same case for the soundtrack, which is the same until you reach the end of the game.

eastasiasoft games usually have easy Platinum trophies, and Swapshot is no exception. You basically have to reach level 30 out of the 35 levels on offer, and that’s it. And since the game is Cross-Buy between the PlayStation 4 and PlayStation 5 versions of the game, you could get a second Platinum for the same price if you own a PS5 console. Each list has one Silver trophy and 11 Gold trophies for you to unlock. If you need some extra help, you can always check out this Swapshot Trophy Guide.

Swapshot is an action puzzle game that has some fun puzzles, but I thought the game lacked variety as it progressed through the 35 levels. Since the Platinum trophy can be obtained within half an hour or so, and the game is Cross-Buy between the PS4 and the PS5 versions, this one is easy to recommend to trophy hunters. Swapshot is available on PlayStation at a budget price of only $4.99.

Disclaimer
This Swapshot review is based on a PlayStation copy provided by eastasiasoft.