Trine 5 Takes You on the Series' Longest Adventure Yet on PS5, PS4 | Push Square

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The Trine series has been around for nearly 15 years, releasing four pretty puzzle platformers of varying quality in that time. The third game attempted to bring the beloved character-swapping action to a 3D plane. When that didn't work out, the follow-up returned to the side-scrolling action beloved by fans, and everything was right with the world. Today, developer Frozenbyte has announced the next instalment, Trine 5: A Clockwork Conspiracy, and it looks to be delivering more of that comfortingly familiar gameplay.

Telling a new story, our usual band of heroes — Amadeus the wizard, Pontius the knight, and Zoya the thief — is under threat from an army of clockwork knights, built to put an end to the trio. A malevolent queen wants to quash their heroics once and for all, and it's up to you — and, optionally, some co-op buddies — to stop that happening. Of course, the story is mostly background to allow for another gorgeous, physics-based adventure, and Trine 5 appears to have that in spades.

These games are side-scrolling puzzle platformers, emphasising the interplay between the three player characters. They each have their own abilities, and you'll need to swap them in and out to deal with tricky obstacles in your path. There's also some light combat where, again, each hero has their strengths and weaknesses. Trine 5, which the developer points out will be the «longest Trine yet», appears to be largely more of the same, but with one or two new wrinkles to keep things fresh.

For starters, each character has some new tricks up their sleeves; one example is Pontius' newfound ability to embed his sword in walls, creating a makeshift platform you can bounce on, while Zoya can attach her ropes to its hilt. Using abilities new