Today I’m gonna be talking about Mushroom Quest, a casual indie puzzle game from Flying Islands Team. Once every blue moon, an iconic game comes along. One that changes how the game industry works. One that changes how video games are viewed as a whole. Conversely, some games like to stay within their comfort zone, never pushing the boundaries of the industry. Mushroom Quest is one such game.
Is it fun-gi?
Starring a small purple and white mushroom, the player is tasked to overcome quite a number of obstacles. Pitfalls, locked gates, and many other things too. Along the way, a multitude of crystals must be obtained. Each of the 30 levels is pretty well designed, but there isn’t much the character can do outside of pushing blocks and picking up keys. These limited abilities are combined to create some decent challenges though.
There is an unfortunate lack of content though with no fleshed-out story to speak of. Whilst cute, the little mushroom guy doesn’t have much characterisation. There’s no real incentive to emphasize with the character. A short dialogue box at the beginning of the quest would have been appreciated. Even if the character itself had a name, it would have at least been something. It that would have gone a good way in enhancing the experience.
Worth the price?
However, I did enjoy the levels. The mechanics are introduced at a good pace but it didn’t seem to get all that challenging until about level 10. Which is a full third of the way through the content on offer. If there were more levels, I would have happily continued playing through. Restarting the level after dying was almost instantaneous. In total, it took me about an hour and a half in one sitting to get through everything.
Visually, the main mushroom hero is designed well, but everything else just seems to be a little generic and drab. The artwork itself isn’t bad. I do actually think whoever created the art assets is talented. Each item is recognizable. A crate looks like a crate. But with such a large library of pixel art puzzle games available, there’s not a huge amount in this game to make it stand out from the rest.
Overall, Mushroom Quest lacks content. What is there, I really enjoyed. The graphics are a little bland, and the music is a little generic. That being said, the game is less than £5. If you have a few Nintendo Gold Points left over, you could do a lot worse. If you want to see the video that inspired this review, I’ve linked it below.
Disclaimer: A code was provided for this game to aid in writing this review.
