Sootwick: arena survivor

The arena is dark, and your light shrinks by itself, all the time.

Every enemy that falls drops an ember. Walk over it and you get light back. Simple to say, and it changes everything: your gun only aims inside your light. When the radius shrinks, you see less and you miss more.

Circling forever, the move that always works in this kind of game, kills you slowly here. Stop killing and you stop gathering embers; stop gathering embers and you go blind in the middle of the horde.

Seven nights, each with its goal written on screen. Light the braziers in the field, bring down the boss, hunt a brood, fill your lantern with embers. Every night brings a new creature and runs three to six minutes. Clearing all seven opens the endless night: fifteen minutes and three bosses.

• You do not shoot: your finger only walks, and the gun handles the rest. Double-tap to dash, a short burst that crosses the horde unharmed. And spend gathered embers on the flare, which burns and shoves everything around you and gives your light back.
• Every level, three finds drop on the ground, out of 24 upgrades, and you walk to the one you want. None of them is just a bigger number. Range lets you kill what is still in the dark; pickup lets you gather embers without walking into the horde; a thicker wick lets you play longer away from the crush.
• Eight creatures, each demanding a different answer: the runner arrives first, the armored one has to be gone around, the spitter hurts from afar, the brood gets worse when it dies, and the shade only exists outside your light.

• Five hunters and three fields, each with a way of playing of its own. The Lantern sees the whole night and dies to a single bump; the Smith has no range at all and burns whatever comes close; Ash lives off the kill.
• Embers left over from the night buy, back at camp, what stays forever.

No ads. No energy. No paid revive. The run ends when it ends, and starting again is instant. The store sells hunters and fields: different ways to play, never an advantage. The two free hunters go all the way to the end of the night, and no paid one is stronger than they are.

Plays offline. The game only talks to Google Play: to check and make purchases and, just once, to ask for a review.

Single player. Plays with no internet.