Taking a break from our regularly scheduled Comic Con coverage, here’s a look at a brand new iOS mobile game out of the Netherlands. Heroki takes you on a journey throughout Levantia from the point of view of a young Japanese Hey Arnold! / propeller-headed protagonist in search of a stolen artifact that protects and gives power to Heroki’s small village. You have the choice of using touch controls to push, pull or shitty joystick emulate our hero around the screen. Bad guys and hostile wildlife are fought by picking up boxes and slingshotting them Angry Birds style. Three worlds with eight levels apiece give a good amount of content for a mobile title. It’s a beautiful art style with great 3D effects. It’s just hard to get past the innately janky controls of a touch screen.
You’re pretty much side scrolling left to right, with your propeller giving you 360 degrees of free movement. There are a few different collectibles hidden throughout each map that give you money, lives or powerups. Music is light and playful, but nothing really memorable. Sound effects are solid, and the bright color scheme makes it a pleasant place to spend some time. One of the first mini games available is stacking boxes to a certain height in the allotted time. This is where the game shines brightest, as the physics look and feel fantastic, especially considering it’s an in-house engine and the debut game of the four man team Picomy Games.
All that makes it heart breaking that I couldn’t go on after the second level, for two reasons. First, Heroki is insanely easy. Skim the bottom of the screen, double back across the top, fly straight up the middle and you have every hidden collectible there is. But when you check your inventory, it only tells you the cumulative total of items you’ve found from previous levels. There’s no way to know if you’ve found everything in your current stage. Second, and most frustrating, are the controls. Completely not Picomy’s fault, it’s the nature of the mobile game beast. The corner joystick circles are terrible no matter what. Have Heroki follow your finger and you can’t see where he’s going. That leaves you with pushing the character from behind, but without having the option to change the sensitivity it’s nearly impossible to work out precise maneuvers around enemies and terrain.
A physical joystick could make this a great title for young gamers on the go. But easy gameplay with difficult controls makes me wonder what demographic this game would do well with. The $7.99 price tag makes me even more hesitant to recommend it to anyone. I get it. The five years of development definitely shows. It’s a solid engine and a huge, great looking playground. But it still doesn’t make up for shitty controls. I’m curious to see how the game sells, and I definitely want to keep an eye on the very talented studio. It’s just a bummer their first game is on the wrong platform.
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