Online, Dec 2024
The pandemic spurred a wave of innovation in games that could be played from home, and while some approaches were more successful than others, Headlock’s Zoom-based mashup of puzzles, puppets and songs was absolutely one of the finest creations to emerge from that. I missed the prequel game Rise of the Fungi the first time round but caught it when it was briefly available again for a few days only; rumour suggests both games may make further appearances again in the future.
Rise of the Fungi tells the origin story of the original game’s villain Paxillus, and those who’ve played that one may be surprised to discover what a mild-mannered and friendly character he is. If you haven’t played the original game, then you should do that one first – although I guess this more or less works as a stand-alone, the story would be confusing without that context.
And in gameplay, the two games are of a piece. All the wackiness and charm of the other are on full display here, all the elements that made it such a hit are back for more. As before, the action happens in custom-built dioramas, delightful in detail, where the main character is a puppet moving around in response to your instructions. Each scene is a work of art as well as being a self-contained puzzle challenge. And seamless cut scenes turn these into a connected narrative, leading you through a world of delightfully weird creatures who have a tendency to burst into song.
The puzzles and story are of course all-new, while following a familiar template. There are some nice new ideas, but this gives fans of the first game a chunky dose of the same sort of thing, not anything radically new; but then there’s no reason to mess with a formula that works so well.
The main frustration when we played was that there were multiple significant technical issues. Some of that might be because several games were being run back to back after several months’ break, with little opportunity to fix issues between games; but the main impact on us was just a delayed start, which was fine. We also has patchy picture quality, which is shame when the visuals are such an important part, both for the game’s appeal and for spotting puzzle solutions; that might be due to Zoom, which is worse in a way, since that means it may be out of the creator’s control. But it may also be because we were playing from overseas.
Even so, I had a great time and was delighted to make a return trip to Paxillus’s world. I’ve been eagerly recommending the first game to all and sundry ever since I played it, and continue to do so; and if you’ve played that and want a second helping, that’s exactly what this provides. 