Right. There’s a whole backstory — a whole mess of lore, as we like to call to it — with regards to Atooi’s Hatch Tales. You can read about it in detail here or, TL;DR, it’s six years late releasing and its Kickstarter backers have been rightly miffed, and more than a little concerned.
Anyway, it’s here now, and when this particular writer first clapped eyes on its mobile phone aesthetic, well, we’ve never been more convinced we were about to be treated to an absolute disaster. However, this is not the case. Surprise surprise, haters, Hatch Tales is actually very good.
It might not heal all wounds, as Atooi was notoriously poor at communicating its plans of action throughout development, and if we could mark it down for this stuff we would, but the fact is that the game itself is a very smart and fiendishly addictive little treat.
There’s not really too much to explain in terms of the gameplay loop; you guide Hatch around chunky little levels with a hookshot, a beaky attack, and restricted movement, and this inability to bound in any and all directions is a good decision for such a small-scale game, one that focuses you in on making well-timed jumps, and avoiding the game’s colourful menagerie of enemies by tiny margins. It opens up and adds movements and tricks as it goes, don’t worry, but it never loses this small-scale focus, which we love.
As Hatch ventures forth through traps and past foes (or you can hookshot and peck to kill ’em), he’ll collect shiny treasures (100 per level) and, if you’re super observant and patient, you can also nab a scroll that unlocks a second playable zone or crack open a tear in space-time to enter a bonus area. You also unlock access to Mutant Mudds levels as you go. If you’ve ever played the superlative Mutant Mudds before, in fact, the rhythm and flow of things here is very similar, just replace water-shooting-hover-backpack-doodah with grapple and pecking abilities. Sorted.
Well, not quite. There are also abilities scattered around to give you speed boosts and so on, so you can boost across falling blocks and the like. If we sound a little dismissive of old-school, low-key stuff like this, we aren’t meaning to be. This is a very exactingly-made thing, an expertly put-together little adventure that really gives you a challenge if you look to collect every last coin and scroll. Each and every level is a little brain/reflex workout that just feels good, even if it all looks a little naff.
Originally, the beefy boy Hatch, whom you play as here — and who comes across as a sort of Angry Birds version of Link — was a much more cutesy character called Chicken Wiggle, who used a worm, instead of Hatch’s grapple, to pull himself around levels. Atooi changed direction somewhere along the line and swapped Chicken Wiggle out for this ‘cooler’ protagonist.
Why on earth are we bothering to tell you this? Because, you see, you can play the core campaign mode as Hatch, but you can also enter a title screen cheat code to unlock Chicken Wiggle’s OG levels, which were made available some time ago to backers. This separate campaign also lets you switch between retro and modern graphics.
All of this adds up to an indie platform/puzzle delight that’s got a surprising amount of depth to it, especially given the price of entry (which, despite what the game looks like from the outside, actually feels reasonable once you’ve played the thing). Oh, and as a bonus cherry on top, you can create and share your very own little blocky levels and challenges with the community – there are already a few offerings on there.
It’s had its problems, and it’s just a little later than scheduled in arriving. But, in the end, what we’ve got is a lovingly made ode to the sorts of platformers that are fantastic but might have you pulling your hair out every now and again. Listen, it’s how this writer went bald, and he’s not sorry.
Conclusion
Hatch Tales, as late as it is in arriving, has ended up really surprising us. This is a delightful retro platformer, full of challenge and focus, that gives you a whole bunch of fun ways to play. Even with just the core campaign, with its smart level design and laser-like focus on doing what it’s doing very well, we’d have been satisfied, but the addition of retro Chick Wiggle and Mutant Mudds modes, alongside the online creation offerings, make for a very tidy package indeed, thank you very much.
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