Chroma Zero
Release date: Dec 12, 2024
Developers: ekorz
Publishers: ZeroXP
Genres: Adventure, Indie
Categories: Single-player, Steam Achievements, Camera Comfort, Color Alternatives, Custom Volume Controls, Playable without Timed Input, Stereo Sound, Partial Controller Support, Steam Cloud, Family Sharing
Supported languages: English, German, Spanish - Spain, Dutch, Japanese, Korean, Polish, Portuguese - Brazil, Simplified Chinese, Ukrainian, French, Italian, Russian

Explore a unique and connected world. Understand its fragile balance, uncover its deepest questions, and find more than just the answers. Chroma Zero immerses you in a universe of mystery, color, energy, and movement, and challenges your expectations and intuition. There are no levels, the puzzles are integrated into the fabric of the space itself, and everything can change in the blink of an eye. Exploration and curiosity are rewarded. Key Features Knowledge Based Progression – Learn the rules of the space, and you can progress farther in the world and deeper into the mystery Open-world Puzzles – Explore everywhere, the world itself is the puzzle. There are no levels. Extremely Dynamic Environment – The world reacts to your actions in dramatic fashion An enchanting and beautiful Original Score by Adam Kromelow and Dan Rufolo Narrative with charm and wit, and at times, wit and charm Gameplay Players generally take between 6 and 12 hours to finish the game, and a bit more to explore everything. Most progress is gated only by knowledge, which is gained by exploring and experimenting. This is an immersive, non-linear, risk-taking and moderately challenging 'Metroidbrainia' game, made by a solo developer (hi there). The narrative is mostly light-hearted, but can be impactful at times. The puzzles ramp up in difficulty, though the game helps to guide you as well. So if you're exploring everywhere, you will know what to do -- maybe just not how to do it! I was inspired by games like Antichamber, Outer Wilds, Myst/Riven, and the discovery elements of Tunic. I hope to bring more games like these into the world, since by their nature they are focused on giving you a wonderful and surprising first-playthrough. Extras Controller Support – This game works 100% with controllers except for adjusting items in the 'Settings' subsection of the main/pause menu system. So, if you want to do stuff like change your resolution, adjust the sensitivity, adjust the key-bindings, turn on/off motion blur, etc. etc. it is ALL THERE for your fiddling pleasure, but you need a mouse to do it. Please forgive me this one trespass, dear gamer. Color Vision Deficiency Mode – An overlay can be positioned in any corner of the screen, or in the center, which describes the point-of-interest you're currently looking at. Photosensitivity Modes – A Brightness Offset adds range to the in-game brightness slider, and adds low-contrast animations to soften otherwise high-contrast events. An intro-animation offset adjusts the way the game starts, which typically involves a symmetrical pattern repeating across the screen. The offset makes it asymmetric. Speedrun Timer – A reposition-able timer starts on Play, and stops during dialogue sequences, but otherwise continues until game-over. Also, if this timer is enabled, the button-hold to delete your save file is sped up so fresh restarts can happen more quickly. Visit our discord for more speedrunning discussion and leaderboard links. Secrets – (..uh, spoiler!..) You can pet the cat(s) 

Press reviews: “...there are only a handful of first-person puzzle games that have ever pulled me in that hard so well done XD” Alex Beachum - Creative Director of Outer Wilds “Chroma Zero expands on the 'metroidbrainia' formula to offer a unique and challenging experience.” Andréas Andrieux - Thinky Games “Chroma Zero as a unique intermediate between the pure riddle-like 'puzzles' of Outer Wilds and a more traditional puzzle game like Antichamber. [...] It stands as a great experience on its own and as an example of the type of game that I wish we had more of.” Brungo - thebrungo on twitch