Originally published on June 29, 2014.

After playing Philadelphia-based indie developer Cleaversoft’s EarthNight at E3 2014, I’ve come to the conclusion that stabbing dragons in the head has never felt so right.

EarthNight is a PlayStation 4 runner-type game where dragons have taken over the planet. The remnants of humanity have fled to space, and two unlikely heroes – a 14 year-old schoolgirl named Sydney and an unemployed photographer named Stanley – decide to do something about the fate of mankind.

I wouldn’t say that endless runners have been a favorite genre of mine, although I do enjoy their challenge and accessible nature. Nevertheless, EarthNight stuck out to me, particularly in its visual undertaking and its unique premise.

“From a gameplay perspective, we set out to make the deepest, most beautiful runner game of all time,” Cleaversoft’s Rich Siegel told me after my hands-on with the game at Sony’s booth. “We’ve liked all these runner games on iOS, but feel like they lack depth. They don’t have the kind of depth of a game or what we’d expect from an awesome game. So we set out to make one with a lot of depth. One that is a big step up from everything out there.”

If canceling the dragon apocalypse as a schoolgirl and a hobo photographer already sounds awesome to you, then I encourage you to read on.