Heatwave Antarctica Game Review

Heatwave Antarctica Game Background

Heatwave Antarctica is a puzzle platformer game where you control a melting ice cube.

Our hosted version of this game is published in HTML5. Alessandro Pezzetti’s Havana 24 submitted a Flash version of this game to the June / July jackpot jam back in 2020.

How to Play Heatwave Antarctica

Press the gray PLAY button on the loading screen to bring up the welcome screen. Press the first level ice cube button on the welcome screen to start the first level.

Press the WASD keys or the arrow keys to move the ice cube around the stages.

When you go into water you automatically sink downward and can not get hurt by the sun’s rays. The A key or the up arrow key are used both to jump and to swim up.

Press the down key or the S key while jumping to split the ice cube in half. Press the space bar to switch which ice cube you are controlling.

Press the R key to reset the current level.

Basic Gameplay Advice

This game features 12 stages which are unlocked sequentially.

Push ice blocks and stones around the stage to create a safe path to the ice sheet.

Run into switches to open red gates. Step on buttons with 1 of 2 ice cubes, put a stone on a button, or set an ice sheet on a button to open red gates activated by buttons.

Try to minimize how much time you are exposed to sunlight above water to minimize melting. If the cube gets to 25% size the level is lost and you have to play it again.

Advanced Playing Tips & Strategy

Some of the sunbeams move back and forth, while others alternate between being wide or narrow. As much as possible try to pass through the sunbeams when underwater so you don’t melt, and move quickly through them when going through them above ground.

Some stones need fully knocked off to act as steps, whereas other stones might be useful as extensions of the platforms they are on to make jumps better.

On some stages it can make sense to split the ice cube right away, while on other levels it can make sense to do the level as a single ice cube for most of the journey then split closer to the end.

Some stages might take multiple tries to figure out the best path on.

Educational Aspects

This game should help kids improve hand eye coordination along with creative problem solving skills.

Player Age Recommendations

This is a fun game for all ages. The game also has an environmental theme baked into it, where the finish screen highlights a power plant and human impacts on the environment.