Gift Ten Industry recently launched an official website for their upcoming puzzle-solving adventure game MR ELEVATOR. The website (in Japanese) gives insight into the development of this award-winning Japanese indie title, which is set to launch on Steam and Nintendo Switch in spring 2025. It will be playable in English, Japanese and Chinese.

The gameplay in MR ELEVATOR involves riding an elevator to different floors and solving puzzles so that you can move up to the next floor. The elevator and each floor represent a person’s memories. As you journey through the game you will encounter all kinds of strange scenes on each floor, including endless corridors and vast deserts. Solving the puzzles and riding the elevator to new floors, you will delve into deeper memories and eventually find out the truth behind the story.

Japanese surreal puzzle game Mr Elevator old TVs inside elevator

The game’s bold, colorful graphics make it feel like it was drawn in Microsoft Paint, and the title has a surreal, trippy atmosphere. From the game’s first-person perspective, you can control their left and right arms- white limbs that stretch out as if they were elasticated. You can use your hands to solve puzzles by pressing buttons, picking up and combining objects, and otherwise interacting with the bizarre places you find yourself in. You will also need to listen out for fragmented voices and noises and use your imagination to work out what is going on.

Nintendo Switch game Mr Elevator solving puzzles with stretchy arms

The official website reveals that the project was originally started back in 2021, and has taken many twists and turns to arrive at MR ELEVATOR. Gift Ten Industry started out making a Switch game called “Cassette Tape Detective,” in which players would listen to different testimonies recorded on cassette tapes and work out the truth. The team then developed a prototype called Mystery Odyssey. Set in space, it involved listening to voices recorded on an actual cassette tape (Gift Ten is also involved in making analogue games, and even their previous digital games like Madorica Real Estate have hybrid pen-and-paper elements).

The concept of a spaceship then morphed into an elevator that could connect to various worlds. The vivid, MS Paint style graphics emerged from the idea that the game should look like it was simply imagined by the player. The devs even made a TRPG-style card game, which they could play to brainstorm ideas for each floor the player visits.

Cassette Tape Detective and the analogue card game used to come up with floor ideas for Mr Elevator — *Cassette Tape Detective concept image (left) and the analogue card game used to come up with floor ideas for MR ELEVATOR (right) (image: Gift Ten Industry website)*.

Back in July 2024, MR ELEVATOR won the PlayStation Award at Bitsummit Drift in Kyoto, Japan. It will be interesting to see what the final game will be like when it is released next year.

MR ELEVATOR is scheduled to be released on PC via Steam (Windows/macOS) and Nintendo Switch in spring 2025.

Based on the original Japanese article by Taijiro Yamanaka (original article’s publication date: 2024-12-26 17:44 JST)