I don’t want to think about the number of hours I have spent watching time trial runs from the demo of Demon Tides, but I can’t help but find them strangely hypnotising. Seeing someone else completing a perfect run, with no visible mistake, even a recovery jump out of reflex, is a sight to behold. I certainly can’t claim to have that level of skill when it comes to 3D platformers, or platformers in general, but I can appreciate the dedication and prowess regardless, and I can also enjoy those same titles, albeit with more mistakes. After spending a few hours in the demo myself, I was as ready for Demon Tides as I could ever be, and while I had a great deal of fun dashing and gliding around its vast ocean world, it wasn’t smooth sailing throughout.
Demon Tides is the direct sequel to Fabraz’s previous release, Demon Turf, back in 2021, with you playing as the newly crowned queen of the demon turfs, Beebz. After receiving an invitation to meet the ruler of Ragnar’s Rock, Ragnar himself, the rebellious, occasionally bratty Beebz sets off with her rag-tag bunch of buddies on a new adventure. But this isn’t just a meeting of two demonic rulers; Beebz believes that Ragnar might be her father, and she wants answers to a whole host of questions about who she is and what happened to her family.
Arriving at the vast seas of Ragnar’s Rock, the crew discovers a kingdom trampled under Ragnar’s boot and quite literally shackled by giant chains that stretch across the waves, dividing the game into three segments, each controlled by one of Ragnar’s champions. After meeting with Runa, the fiery leader of the rebellion, Beebz is tasked with collecting Gold Gears from the islands peppered throughout the ocean to power Runa’s giant cannon. This will help the demon queen and her friends reach the other two segments of Ragnar’s Rock and finally Ragnar’s floating castle for a final confrontation.
I was looking forward to a straightforward adventure full of action, attitude, and activities, but I was pleasantly surprised by how Demon Tides’ narrative wasn’t afraid to go a little deeper, revealing a story about a dysfunctional family and how people handle hardship. However, this storyline is embellished by reaching specific islands that contain memories for Beebz to see, so I imagine the impact of this theme will vary from player to player.
While its predecessor, Demon Turf, was more of a precision platformer that required a near-perfect performance to progress, Demon Tides is more forgiving in a general sense, focusing more on “expressive” movement and finding a flow. Beebz still has the same outlandish move set from her first game, featuring her bat-form double-jump, demonic spinning glide, side or back jump, and the 3-jump chain, but she also has a boost, which she can use to smash into enemies. Getting to grips with Beebz’s moveset and understanding all the ways they can be chained together, equipping different talisams you find to alter them, and crafting your move set the way you want it is the beating heart of Demon Tides.
The game features loadouts for Beebz that you can change on the fly, along with the option to equip different talismans whenever you want. You can also place your own checkpoint to help you when taking on longer platforming challenges, which I made liberal use of throughout my 14-hour playthrough, no doubt removing a great deal of frustrated retries from the beginning. I appreciate this more balanced approach to difficulty in Demon Tides, giving players the tools to not only alter their move set to make things easier or harder, but also pick and choose when to put down a checkpoint flag. While I did use a few different talismans to change my moves to suit the occasion, I wouldn’t say I was jumping back and forth between loadouts or in menus, switching out talismans. Once I found the ones I liked, that did it for me, and I think that is Demon Tides’ greatest strength.
The islands dotted amongst the waves of Ragnar’s Rock are where you’ll put your platforming skills to the test, with each one offering different challenges to overcome and earn rewards. I always enjoyed discovering what each island had to offer, from platforming up a giant structure to hopping between grind rails way above the waves, or even diving deep into gloomy caverns. Some islands even had strange phenomena to contend with, like bubbles of low gravity or power-ups that temporarily altered one of your moves, creating whole new ways to play. Fabraz have made sure that no two islands feel the same, and that all of them have something to offer.
Alongside the Gold Gears that Beebz and the gang need to progress, you can also look forward to unlocking and buying hundreds of different outfits and hairstyles for their demon queen, another great way for players to express themselves and get creative. On every island is a certain number of Eyetems, little purple icons, that work as the game’s currency. In fact, Demon Tides has some of the best progress tracking I have seen in a video game, frankly ever, with each island getting its own list, all gathered under each section of Ragnar’s Rock. It made tracking where to find more Gold Gears and talismans very easy, and will be greatly appreciated by completionists, I’m sure. But it doesn’t end there! Demon Tides also has a selection of fun multiplayer elements to add even more challenge and imagination, with players able to compete against each other for the fastest time completing an island’s task, or leaving graffiti for others to find and admire.
Transforming Beebz into her snake form lets players swim at great speed across the seas of Ragnar’s Rock, making it easy to discover and reach new island locations. The option to fast travel between islands you have visited is a great addition. I will say that this is where some rough edges in Demon Tides’ design start to show, with the rest of the ocean almost empty, save for the odd hoop to jump through. It is nice to hold down the right trigger and just cruise to a land mass on the horizon, but I would have enjoyed the odd optional event on the way from A to B. In the end, I used the fast travel system to get where I needed to, and didn’t feel like I missed out on much because of it.
Unfortunately, this segues into another issue I had with Demon Tides, which was the egregious amounts of pop-in I saw each time I approached an island. Early on, I had some minor issues with screen tearing due to certain textures, with turning vsync on fixing that, but I was unable to get rid of the startling way whole land masses would transform in the blink of an eye when I got within a certain distance.
My last sticking point with Demon Tides, and I use that term specifically, is that there were quite a few times when I found myself caught on the world’s geometry or experiencing strange collision physics. One platforming segment had me swinging between poles to get higher, but Beebz would randomly let go without prompting, causing many a restart. When I was standing on elevators, it was accompanied by the repeated sound of Beebz landing on the ground, and once or twice, I found myself suddenly stuck in one place whilst swimming, quickly remedied by jumping. These all feel like issues that can be fixed with a patch or two, but it definitely seems as though Demon Tides could have done with more polishing.
While the game may have its technical hiccups, they don’t do anything to diminish the vibrant and cartoonish world of Demon Tides. Not a single colour is spared in bringing Ragnar’s Rock to life, and each zone, with its smattering of islands and ruins, looks and feels distinct, from blue skies and crumbling skyscrapers to spooky shores and ghost ships. Intrepid explorers may find secrets and new areas as well, with several locations hiding a lot more beneath the water than above it.
The cast of Demon Tides is a crazy bunch, with Beebz and her buddies being the stars of this show. A lot of the dialogue is fun and pretty silly, with characters bantering with each other and Beebz or asking for her help. The game’s animations, both in cutscenes and gameplay, are smooth and, you guessed it, expressive, giving each of Beebz’s jumps and spins a burst of energy, and every scowl the perfect amount of eyetwitching. It all works so well, giving Demon Tides the appearance of a Saturday morning cartoon with a touch of anime, and I love it.
The soundtrack to Demon Tides is an amazing blend of upbeat, catchy tunes perfect for sun-soaked adventures, mixed with a 90’s spirit that pulls in genres like D’nB to bring the energy. Fat Bard and 2 Mello have done an excellent job on the music, embodying the groovy, often chaotic nature of Demon Tides’ world and inhabitants, most notably Beebz herself.
Final Thoughts
Despite some technical issues, I had a great time with Demon Tides, from my first double jump to my last spin rush. The beautiful world and fun character designs, the amount of customisation to both move set and character appearance, as well as the bumping soundtrack, mostly made up for any frustrations and metaphorical skinned knees I went through. I have no doubt speedrunners and platformer fans, far more skilled than I, will find no end of fun in Ragnar’s Rock, and will be competing for top spots on the game’s leaderboards for years to come.
Demon Tides is available on February 19th on PC and is scheduled to release on Nintendo Switch sometime in 2026. There is also a demo available on PC (Steam), which we highlighted in a back issue of the GSC Demo Disc.
Demon Tides was reviewed on PC with a controller.
We would like to thank Fabraz for providing the review key.
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