A couple of weeks ago as a Father’s Day present to myself I bought Toki Tori on WiiWare. I hadn’t heard anything about this game really before I saw a brief amount of play on GoNintendo. This clip alone sold me on the fact that I should buy this title. It has often been referred to in the same vein as Lemmings or Lost Vikings and I can’t really disagree with this comparison.
In fact, it really is this same type of strategy platformer that those previous games largely became famous for. Toki Tori is an egg-shaped chicken that is tasked with rescuing eggs in a number of locations. He does this by roaming through the levels and using various tools to get past enemies and obstacles in order to attain the desired egg. The courses can be quite tricky and in fact right now I am stuck on one particular course in the third world.
A nice thing about the game that I think will really attract Wii owners is that the levels are all very short, and you can turn it off whenever you want. This means that I can come home from work and do a few levels quick and then turn it off. It is really a nice casual game. Another nice thing is that it is very different. I don’t think there are any similar types of games on the Wii. In fact, this genre has largely been dead for a few generations. The only real remaining series in the genre is the Worms series which has been bad for years. So it is really a breath of fresh air to the console and can hopefully help rejuvinate the genre.
I think the graphics are great and the sound is quite charming. There really isn’t anything to write home about, but for the WiiWare and only $10 the game really is quite nice overall.
My only real complaint on the game is that in the levels you get only as many uses out of each item as you need. My complaint isn’t that you have to start over if you screw up, that’s fine. But it becomes predictable to how to finish a level just by looking at the items you have. I often sit there and go “ok how am I supposed to use this 3 times.” If it looks like I’m using too few I know I did something wrong, and this is a tell to the game that I don’t fully enjoy.
Another minor complaint is that it doesn’t totally feel like a $10 title. Perhaps if there were some online leader boards, or some sort of multi-player option it would be worth the price. But as is, maybe only $7-8. Still you don’t totally feel ripped off for paying the full price.
Overall I give the game a B+.