ICEY is basically a one hour Strider-like with some meta-commentary on 'the nature of gamedev' stacked on top of it. It's gimmicky nature is ultimately saved by the unique novelty of the 'Chinese gamedev' perspective. I tend to detest games which revel in self-indulgent indie navelgazing but ICEY is ultimately a lot more good-natured than something like The Stanley Parable. ICEY's narrator oscillates between pathetic and relatable in a very human way, which is endearing, and makes some of the twists and turns the game can take when you thwart him a bit more exciting, so it's just a shame that the underlying Metroidvania-layer of the game is pretty 'meh' from a gameplay perspective. Great art/style, though and for ~10 bucks it's hard to argue that I didn't get my money's worth.
