We Love It's Guide to…
As exchange student Kotama, explore a reality-bending academy, unlock traversal powers, and fight for its highest honor.
Released 14 Jan 2026
Fight With Three Weapons
Parry, Then Detonate
Plan Timed Student Quests
In the Academy Citadel, strength reigns supreme: only the most powerful survive and thrive. Fight your way through the high-tech Academy in your quest to get the highest of honors for a student, and uncover secrets that can save it in its direst crisis in this 2.5D side-scrolling Metroidvania.
Developed by Atomstring Games · Published by 2P Games
Kotama, a mysterious exchange student, enters Carmel Academy during its Carmel Star election, hoping to earn the school’s highest honor. As the academy faces a crisis, she explores its high-tech halls, unusual biomes, and reality-bending secrets.
This 2.5D side-scrolling adventure combines exploration, combat, and platforming. Unlock abilities to cross obstacles and reach new areas, then revisit earlier rooms to find hidden passages, shortcuts, gear, and upgrades.
Fight with three switchable weapons, chaining attacks and skills with Memocards, parrying enemy strikes, and using Fluid Detonation to finish combos. Help students through side quests, manage the time advanced by moving between rooms, and make choices that affect your path through the election.
Many reviewers enjoy the combat’s weapon variety, parries, and combo finishers, along with Kotama’s responsive movement and the academy’s secrets and distinct areas. Character artwork and boss encounters also draw frequent praise. Experiences are mixed: some players find platforming and certain boss fights punishing, while others appreciate the challenge or use the platforming assists.
Welcome to Carmel, an Academy Citadel renowned for its cutting-edge technology, where survival of the fittest is the only law and strength reigns supreme.
The "Carmel Star" —symbolizing the ultimate honor— is the goal students dream of. As the Centennial Anniversary approaches, a new "Carmel Star Election" is about to begin.
You represent a mysterious "exchange student" who suddenly appears, determined to join the competition.
To get the Carmel Star you will have to explore the sprawling labyrinth that is the Academy Citadel, a treacherous place where technology can unravel reality itself with mind-bending illusions, impossible machines, and self-contained biomes.
Each area demands mastery of your fluid powers. Use your special abilities to overcome deadly traps. Return to previous zones with your newfound powers to uncover secrets hidden behind illusory walls and locked gates, revealing shortcuts and unexpected treasures.
In this Academy where "survival of the fittest" is the only law, exceptional power is the key to turning ambition into reality.
Master Kotama's unique fluid constitution to weave through hordes of bizarre enemies with blistering speed. Switch weapons seamlessly, combining them with skills and Memocards to chain dazzling combos. When your energy peaks, unleash a Fluid Detonation to wipe the field in a flash.
Different sections of the Academy Citadel are guarded by powerful creatures or robots that will stand in your way to the dreamed Carmel Star. They all have unique attacks and game mechanics, but all are strong enough to destroy you in a heartbeat; it will take all your skills to emerge victorious.
Master your opponent's patterns, parry at the critical moment to neutralize lethal strikes, and break their stance. As you enter bullet time, seize the fleeting openings to deliver a decisive, crushing blow.
You are not completely alone in this adventure – there are other peculiar, captivating students scattered across the Academy Citadel! Aid them during your journey, uncover their stories, and earn their loyalty as allies in your search for the Carmel Star. What might seem like a small choice at the moment could make a real difference and end up saving the Academy and deciding your fate.
The Academy Citadel welcomes challengers of all kinds, offering a range of difficulty settings to suit your style. You can choose to immerse yourself in the rich narrative and the joy of exploration on a laid-back difficulty—checking every nook and cranny for gear, weapons, and upgrades to optimize your build. Or crank up the challenge for intense, skill-focused combat that pushes your mastery to its absolute limit.
| Platforms | Windows, Linux |
|---|---|
| Achievements | 40 |
| Age ratings |
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| Controller support | PlayStation, Xbox |
| Controller required | No |
| DLC / extras | 1 listed on Steam |
| Metacritic | 76/100 View on Metacritic |
