Onde is definitely this year's best bubble riding music game Eurogamer.net If you click on a link and make a purchase we may receive a small commission. Read our editorial policy. Onde is definitely this year's best bubble riding music game Pop. Feature by Christian Donlan Features Editor Published on 17 Mar 2022 2 comments Years back, when PomPom - genius developers of slithery arcade treats - wanted to patent an idea they'd just come up with, an idea about controlling elements of a game by dropping little bubbles of air around them to knock them this way and that, the terminology they came up with, I think, was all about "expanding boundaries". It worked a treat - control that felt thrillingly indirect at times. You're in charge, but then you're not in charge. Pick a direction, work out where to plop your expanding boundary. Off you go! Good luck! Onde Publisher: Mixtvision Developer: Lance, 3-50 Platform: Played on PC Availability: Out today on PC, Switch and iOS later in 2022 I am tempted to say that it's been a little too quiet for expanding boundaries ever since. We need more of them in games. But here's Onde, of which I have played about an hour this morning. It's a meditative musical game with abstract shimmering art - a touch of the deep ocean, of the tiny creatures that swarm and multiply in a drop of water, but also, bracingly, something of the spirograph and those geometric sunbursts you get on old bank notes. And guess what, at the heart of it all? An expanding boundary. So far anyway. I started off in a luminous tree. I broke loose from a sort of egg thing up in the branches and discovered that I could survive, moving left and right, only if I was cruising over the surface of a line. So if I was moving over the bubbles that made up the tree's trunk that was fine, say. If I was away from a line too long, my constituent parts would drift off, and I was back to the last checkpoint. Watch on YouTube Take a closer look at Onde. So if you're tethered to a line, how do you move? By expanding boundaries, of course. Press the right face button and certain objects give off expanding boundaries, little bubbles that steadily become big bubbles. It's all beautifully done - the moment you hop onto a bubble there's a little sag and dip in the line as it takes your weight and then holds - and it gets complex quickly. Before long I was matching directions on the face buttons to trigger the next boundary and even hopping back and forth between two, a sort of antiphonal business whose cleverness was so audacious it made me laugh out loud. All this and music too, a piece or pieces coming together as you ride the bubbles across drifting, delicate worlds. Who knows where Onde goes from here? Not me. But I aim to find out. Become a Eurogamer subscriber and get your first month for £1 Get your first month for £1 (normally £3.99) when you buy a Standard Eurogamer subscription. Enjoy ad-free browsing, merch discounts, our monthly letter from the editor, and show your support with a supporter-exclusive comment flair! Support us View supporter archive More Features Feature What games get wrong about horses And what they could do about it. 27 Feature Shout out to all the Overwatch supports - where would we be without you? Merci. 55 Feature From abandoned board game to birthing a genre: Football Manager at 40 Kick off. 21 Feature How I became an Elden Ring detective It started with a save game... 26 Latest Articles Genshin Impact Path of Gleaming Jade dates, login event rewards Including other anniversary rewards and how to claim them. Atari will hold RollerCoaster Tycoon rights for another decade Ups and downs. 7 Jelly Deals Logitech's G Pro X gaming headset is its lowest-ever price during Amazon's Early Access sale Prime Members can get it for just £52. Jelly Deals Save over £500 off the retail price on this beefy ASUS TUF Dash gaming laptop from Amazon Under £1080 for an RTX 3070 laptop. Supporters Only Premium only Off Topic: Take a minute to appreciate Cookin' with Coolio's incredible scallops recipe. What a great book. Premium only Off Topic: Reading City of Glass in comic form "Where exactly am I going?" Premium only Off Topic: Il Buco is a transporting film about a really big hole Underlands. Off-Topic Netflix handled Sandman brilliantly It was Dreamy. 9 Buy things with globes on them And other lovely Eurogamer merch in our official store! Explore our store