One thing that the Switch doesn’t seem to have any lack of, would be budget platformers. While they’re not all alike by any means, breaking down into straight action, puzzle-oriented, or precision platforming, it can be a challenge to muster up some excitement for yet another one showing up in the eShop. While its price and very old-school black-and-white looks are likely the first thing you’ll notice with Ghost Teen, once you get a few levels in you’ll also get a feel for its style that also feels generally refreshing.

The fact that your name is Ghost Teen isn’t a coincidence, and only a few levels in you’ll have your first opportunity to find out all about it. It’s a little unnerving the first time you realize your only remaining option is to essentially kill your character, but it turns out that’s all to plan, with you then turning into a ghost that you can control to float to higher areas or through otherwise inaccessible walls. You will need to use a portal to return to human form in order to exit each stage, but thankfully this is handled mostly in an intuitive way.

What’s nice is that this hook does manage to make the gameplay feel more fresh than the norm, adding just enough complexity with new rules and considerations to be interesting. One oddity that threw me off at first is that sometimes the solution to a particular room is easier than you may assume. There’ll be an extra item or distraction present, but you’ll recognize that you don’t even need to deal with it in order to proceed. While perhaps this is intentional, just to make people think a bit more critically, I’ll admit that it did seem a bit odd periodically, and that can lead to the difficulty feeling very up and down at times.

All in all I’d hardly say it’s perfect, but even with as many titles as I tend to play this did manage to feel fresh and at least mildly inventive. There are elements like box pushing and needing to activate switches to trigger doors that certainly are quite familiar, but the further along you go the more you’ll see a real need to consider the order of what needs to be done in order to be successful. If you’re looking for a reasonable challenge, your funds are limited, and you don’t mind a very old-school aesthetic, it isn’t a bad deal.