Hi, I just want to first out say that this game is a GEM. It’s entertaining. I have not completed it yet but as it stands I’m in world 3. They use old mario notation for stages. 1-1 etc. If you’re on the fence about this game read on, hopefully you’ll see why I love it so much.

Story

The story goes that there is this magical golden suit that renders it’s wearer to able to enter the Puzzle Realm. The suit was made by a character called the Gentleman. He looks like a caveman wearing a suit. Very odd. Your mission is to gather all these pieces!

Graphics

The graphics are pretty sweet for a 2D sprite side scroller. The enemies are awesome looking. It’s got a familiar style but I can’t quite put my finger on it.

Sound

The music is great, you can download it all on the website (down below). The sound effects are good. The text sound is AWESOME. Right O’. Jiminy! Guv’na. Instead of typical text scrolling sounds you get this weird mumble that sounds like speaking with a few words decipherable at the end of the sentence. It’s great, makes me smile every time.

Gameplay

So… just what is this game? A puzzle game? Not in the least. It’s a 2D platformer combined with a block game. You know, the kind where you need to match 3 or more of the same colour.

Ok, so you’ve wrapped your head around the basic concept, 2D platformer à la Mario, Castlevania, etc. and PuzzleQuest combined together.

Now lets get into some details about how this is paired together.

When you get two max bars, you can use TEA TIME! This is your invincible robot powerup (for a limited amount of time). It’s crazy.

Enemy blocks: Eliminate them before they reach the top!

Time blocks: Prolong your time in the Puzzle Realm.

Zap blocks: Eliminate a row or a colour. On the normal realm, lightning will strike and hurt the enemies

Enemy attack blocks: These blocks you cannot move. You have to move colour matching blocks around it just like you would for any other block. If they reach the top and it’s a plant, it will sprout. You get the idea.

Naturally, if you manage to pair more than three, you increase the effectiveness of the special blocks you eliminate. If it’s a heart block, you will heal for more. The hat block powers you up to your young Hatsworth mode.

Using blocks to power up your projectiles is also another nifty trick you can pull off. Immediately after shooting your ranged weapon, enter the puzzle realm and do a few combos, you will notice your projectile changing as you combine more and more blocks.

Difficulty

Not too difficult if you can multitask. Some bosses may have you beat a few times, but if you recognise patterns or just hoard powerup blocks until you reach them you may just get through them without a sweat. The better you are at the block game, the more you’ll reap the benefits. As the game progresses, you’ll have picked up certain tricks along the way too.

Pros

-Fun
-Funny
-It’s PuzzleQuest and a platformer combined!

Cons
-Hmm… what’s bad about this game….
-Nothing? Unless you hate the PuzzleQuest aspect.

Bottom line

I love this game. I highly recommend it.

You can also visit this really awesome site. There’s stuff to download! Kind of overloaded with flash but I’ll forgive them. There’s a group on facebook you can follow too! And a twitter feed.

Now some of the group behind this game apparently have moved on from EA to form their own studio. I doubt we’ll see them put out another game in this franchise as its more than likely owned entirely by EA. But I think they have the potential to dish out even more gems like this game.

Pictures

Young Hatsworth

Robot powerup is awesome for bosses.

Old Hatsworth.

Victor Games, Handheld, Review