Brick-breaker Caromble is out of Early Access today

Ready to hit the bricks? Get it? I bet nobody has used that as a tagline for a block-breaker before. Maybe Caromble should. It’s out of Early Access today on PC, does that make it too late for a tagline?

That’s right, Caromble is a brick-breaker in the vein of Arkanoid or BreakOut, a genre almost as old as video games. Developed by Crimson Owl Studios, it’s been in Early Access since 2015, which is pretty impressive for a game of its genre, though it seems to have been mostly feature-complete since 2023, while the team waited for the right moment to release it. That moment is now, apparently.

I’ve given it a peek, and it’s a pretty good time. I’m not super into brick-breakers, but there’s a good deal of imagination in play here. I dig its art style, which has an uneven, hand-drawn look to it. In the levels I climbed through, you typically have to break boxes and eventually take down a boss. You have the ability to put spin on your shots, which I couldn’t quite get the hang of in the time I spent with it. You can also charge your shot, which is neat. There are other power-ups you unlock as you go, such as the ability to slow down time.

THIS IS CAROMBLE!

I learned of Caromble about a year ago when the devs emailed me to ask for advice on how to market the game, specifically to press. That’s a tough one! Getting coverage is hard these days. A lot of devs resort to paying YouTube folks to cover their games, since trad publications (such as this one) don’t usually accept money for coverage. And, frankly, I don’t know how you’d market it a brick-breaker, especially not these days. With the loss of arcades, they’ve become a niche.

And it’s not a niche that I’m a part of, but the Steam reviews have folks who apparently love these sorts of games and have put dozens of hours into Caromble, which I think is a pretty solid endorsement. For my part, I just like helping devs out. It’s tough out there.

The full release version of Caromble is available today on PC.