Schim review — unique PS5 platformer could have gone harder

In this Schim review, Lee explains why this indie platformer might work for PS5 and PS4 trophy hunters, but also might prove too frustrating for anyone else.

Schim review — unique PS5 platformer could have gone harder
Lee Brady

Lee Brady

Published

If you’re thinking about checking out those Schim trophies on PS5 or PS4, this Schim review will recommend you check it out. That said, in my playthrough I also encountered issues that kept spoiling the game's charming mood. So, while trophy hunters might have a good time, I wouldn't expect to see Schim on our best PS5 indie games list anytime soon.

What is Schim?

One look at Schim’s gameplay (trailer embedded below) and you’ll get almost the entire gist of the game. In this indie darling, you play as a little shadow creature known as a "Schim." From what I can gather from the game’s slightly obscure dialogue-free story, every object has a Schim. You play as the Schim of a boy who quickly becomes a man.
This particular man falls on hard times early on in life — his college girlfriend dumps him, he misses his calling to be a firefighter, and to top it off, he gets fired from his soulless corporate job. Then, when he’s at his lowest, the clumsy goof trips over his own shoes and severs his Schim from his body.

Now, it’s up to you — controlling the frog-like Schim — to reunite with your sad-sack human and presumably fix his life. Unfortunately, you can only exist in the shade, and this guy just loves strolling around in the sunlight. So, if you’re going to reconnect, you’re going to have to chase him across town in the shadows of bikes, cars, birds, and everything else.

Lee

Schim’s simplicity and setting frequently shine through

At its core, Schim is a platformer — plain and simple. Before playing it, I would have presumed it was more of a puzzle-platformer, but that’s not really accurate. Most of the time, you’re simply jumping from shadow to shadow, trying to time the occasional tricky jump or use the odd gimmick to send your Schim from one patch of shade to the next.

Schim

Schim’s easy-to-grasp concept and its simple gameplay are what I’d consider the game’s greatest strengths. It’s an easy game to pick-up and play; pretty much anyone of any age can do so and get something out of it. The Schim looks like a frog for a reason — it echoes the simplicity of an old arcade game like Frogger. No instructions required, just get to jumping and the rest will figure itself out.

Bolstering that simplicity is the game’s delightful setting. The entirety of Schim takes place in a peaceful Dutch-inspired seaside town and I found myself bowed over quickly by the game's easy-breezy vibes. Schim's designers have brilliantly crafted an obstacle course out of the drama-free lives of average people and their surroundings, and I think it leaves a strong impression on the player.

The game’s clever visual style also helps cements this impression with its striking use of color and shadows. Not only do the bright color choices give Schim a unique visual feel, but it also compliments the gameplay. Never once was I frustrated trying to figure out what was and wasn’t a shadow my Schim could jump into, and that was thanks to the clarity provided by the art style.

That’s not to say Schim offers a frustration-free experience — in fact, the game has a number of issues that irked me as I was playing the game. However, before we jump into those, let me just say plainly here that Schim's core platforming and unique visuals stay consistently strong throughout the game.

Schim

Lee

Schim's simplicity leads to frustration

Simplicity can be a double-edged sword when it comes to game design. Frustration in platformers is often rooted in difficulty — whether that be via skill-based challenges (think Super Mario Bros.) or logic challenges (think Braid or Celeste).

By contrast, Schim frustrated me because its simple design lacks any real challenge. That makes it feel unreasonable when your progress gets barred for any reason. This is unfortunately the case in some of Schim's levels, which got under my skin more than a few times during my playthrough.

Part of the problem is Schim’s level design. Most stages of the game take place in a naturalistic-feeling location, like a populated street or a busy road. This choice does help make the game’s setting feel alive, but it also gives the player too many moving shadow platforms to jump on. Often, this led to me ending up off track and going the wrong way just because I stuck to the wrong person's shadow for too long.

Technically, the game has an exploration element (which I’ll get into in the Trophy Tactics section of this review) that sometimes rewards the player when they take a wrong turn. However, for my playthrough I was mostly focused on just clearing each stage. So, when I found myself absent-mindedly going the wrong way every few levels, I felt myself getting needlessly frustrated by Schim's design choices.
Another source of frustration: Schim’s timed jumps. Whether you’re crossing traffic Frogger-style, or using streaks of lightning to chain jumps between lamp lights, you’ll find yourself waiting regularly for platforms to materialize before you can proceed. This might not have been much of an issue in isolation, but in concert with the above it leads to some really irritating moments during gameplay.

For example, there’s one level set on a busy motorway that has you jumping between the shadows of moving cars and long overhead traffic lights. Not only did I find myself lost on a long misadventure with the sheer amount of shadows going on in the stage, but I also found myself waiting for lengthy periods doing nothing as I waited for cars to show up so that I could finally cross from one side of the street to the next.

That stage was, admittedly, one of the rare times in which Schim’s frustrations could all be found in one place. However, you'll find one frustration or another peeking through most levels in the game, meaning you'll spend a small chunk of the entire game annoyed with it. Mercifully, it's not a very long game at roughly three hours of gameplay, but it's enough to make the above feel like major issues.

Schim

Lee

Schim — Trophy Tactics

The good news for PS5 and PS4 trophy hunters is that Schim is a more interesting game if you want to unlock its platinum trophy.

While most players will likely find themselves frustrated by Schim’s expansive level design, the developers have cleverly turned this into a minigame for trophy hunters by hiding special objects to collect somewhere in the game’s many sprawling levels. You’ll need to find all of these objects to unlock the gold ‘Collector’ trophy, one of the game’s most rewarding side objectives.

Trophy hunters will also have to beat all of Schim’s levels at least once with “Extra Jump” turned off (meaning you lose the ability to hop once in the light between shadows) and with “Risky Mode” turned on (meaning you have to start the level over if you miss a jump). These challenges transform the relaxing stages into deadly platforming gauntlets, making the game vastly more engaging to experienced players.

Plus, a generous level select feature makes jumping between each challenge and keeping track of your collectibles a breeze, so props to the designers for really thinking about this side of the game. These features might quietly contribute to the messiness of the main game experience, but they certainly do help make for a solid trophy hunting experience on PS5 and PS4.
Schim

Lee

Schim misses out on its greater potential

Granted, I don’t think I would have minded the gameplay frustrations quite so much had I felt satisfied by Schim on some greater level. Unfortunately, beyond its nice aesthetic and cool concept, there’s not that much else to grasp onto.

The narrative isn’t a bad one, but it unfortunately doesn’t get much more compelling later. Almost every level in Schim follows this formula: our Schim spots their human on the other side of the stage, they get close to catching up, then the human moves away. It’s a repetitive negative sensation watching this guy slip away every time I catch up to him.

It might not have been so bad had the narrative featured more involving or pronounced characters, but it’s really just a story about a frog in pursuit of a perpetually moving goalpost. I mean, we don't have a firm idea of what might even change when we catch the guy — after all, the Schim was with him when his life went downhill too.

Schim

In retrospect, that frustration with the narrative also amplified a little after I played some of the more unique levels near the end of the game. I won’t spoil them, but there are two bigger setpieces near the end that mark a considerable shift in both the narrative and the setting. It takes a while to get to that point, but it's there where the simple platforming and the urgency of the storytelling really meld together well.

It’s just such a shame that these more inventive and involving stages make up such a small part of the game’s runtime. For two levels, Schim teases a bigger and more interesting version of itself, and then it ends. If only the game hadn’t spun its wheels for two hours leading up to those levels, it might have been easier to look past all the little frustrations piling up beneath the game’s attractive surface.

I still think there’s a lot to like about Schim, and I’d recommend it for PS5 and PS4 players looking for a fun and simple game to hunt trophies in. I just think the game also comes with a considerable amount of caveats that ultimately left me with a disappointing experience.

Schim

Summary

Schim is a visually delightful platformer with some genuinely unique ideas that I would love to recommend without hesitation. However, consistent frustrations in the gameplay and narrative department mar the overall experience, making this game better suited for more patient gamers.
6 / 10
* Lee completed a playthrough of Schim in three hours on PS5 and spent an additional hour hunting down collectibles and trying out the game's other settings. A digital code for the game was provided by Pirate PR.
Written by Lee Brady
Staff Writer Lee keeps one eye on the future (Astro Bot), one eye on the past (PS1, PS2, and PS3 games), and his secret third eye on junk he really likes (Final Fantasy, Kingdom Hearts, Sonic). A PlayStation fan for over 25 years, he loves replaying classic games via PS Plus.
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