Save Me Mr. Tako: Definitive Edition is a quintessential time capsule, transporting players into a replication of Nintendo's Game Boy. While the devotion to the time period may not be for everyone, there is undeniable charm here for old-school platformer enthusiasts.
Save Me Mr. Tako: Definitive Edition is a shockingly accurate recreation of those cartridge games you would click into the back of Nintendo’s Game Boy and play through until the four AA batteries died or your road trip was over.
As a kid, my Game Boy was attached to me, especially when I was away from my consoles. While the longest time I spent in a car was usually about an hour, I still remember brief drives consisting of Kirby’s Dream Land or Gargoyle’s Quest.
Envisioned as a project by sole developer Christophe Galati, Save Me Mr. Tako is designed to be a Game Boy game through and through. Care was given to stick to the limitations of the hardware. Green visuals, 4-channel audio, a handful of buttons. Galti worked to make Save Me Mr. Tako a game that could be bound to a cartridge but be mindful of decade’s of gaming progress.
Despite never playing the original from 2018, Definitive Edition offers refinements to perhaps make the game somewhat more appealing to a wider group of players. I think the most notable “improvement” of Definitive Edition is that it offers an extended color palette. Look, I know the Game Boy’s original “puke green” screen wasn’t for everyone but it never bothered me. If Galati wanted to really replicate the experience he would have made LCD screens barely visible when played in light, much like the original Game Boy when the sun was blaring.
Now, Save Me Mr. Tako gets flooded with color. Players are able to switch between a number of palette swamps, from whites and blues to reds and greens. It mimics what the Game Boy Color and Super Game Boy were able to offer older titles. Additionally, there are several frames that players can choose from that literally frame the gameplay screen in fun designs based on Save Me Mr. Tako.
The best implementation of the added color, is that if players select it to automatically change, the palettes will swap between levels and environments, better mimicking what they would actually look like with a hardware boost. Tako’s home will be drenched in darker blues and blacks, while an ocean level may lighten up to a more sky blue. Human worlds are covered in greens and reds and browns. This added touch invigorates the gameplay and its visual appeal a significant amount, especially for those who don’t want to strain their eyes too much.
The original Save Me Mr. Tako had an arguably strenuous difficulty. One-hit kills shouldn’t be out of left field for older players or those who experience grueling games regularly. That being said, Definitive Edition provides players with three difficulty options. An easier difficulty gives players three hits before death. Another retains the one-hit deaths but gives players nine lives to work with. Classic difficulty has one-hit deaths and requires players to earn their lives over the course of the game by collecting 100 gems, just like the classics.
For a “Game Boy game,” Save Me Mr. Tako is a robust platformer. It tells the story of the octopus Tako, stuck in the middle of a war between the octopus world and the human one. During a key battle, Tako rescues a human woman who had been cornered by Tako’s brother, Bako, and the octopus army.
Packed with characters to talk to and some towns, most would have been blown away that a platformer could have so much story in an early 90s game. Now, it’s par for the course. But Save Me Mr. Tako is about creating a game that straddles the line between two time periods and it does that quite well. I can’t say that the story will blow anyone away but it is rife with cute characters that build a world that is inviting and memorable.
The crux of the platforming and action is Tako’s ability to equip a number of hats across his adventures. This hats grant him a number of abilities, quirks, and bonuses. Some are silly and merely cosmetic, other give him weapons to equip like a sword, and others give him extra hit points or are used for quests.
Hats are similar to Kirby’s powers in that they can be tossed and swapped out when encountered. Players can also change houses at a shop in the Octopus Village.
The general flow of gameplay leans on players hopping into one of around 50 levels, working to get to the end door at the level’s close. It’s the standard case of “move left” found in countless games of this type and Galati shows himself to be a relatively smart and experienced level designer.
On the whole, levels exist as a series of platforms and enemies that the player must guide Tako over. Tako can shoot a stream of ink that is managed by a meter that depletes with use but can be replenished. Most enemies struck with Tako’s ink will temporarily freeze in place and may act as a platform that Tako can jump on. This is used to traverse large gaps or reach higher distances where potential secrets may lie.
And Save Me Mr. Tako certainly does invite players to explore its levels as deeply as possible. A few paths and items require a specific hat to reach, inviting a return journey. I found the platforming itself to be relatively tight for the most part. It takes a bit of getting used to Tako’s particular jumping physics and his ability to climb over a just-missed platform’s corner. But once the game’s logic has seeped its way into players, they should be able to traverse the world with relative ease.
At 50 levels of retro-inspired platforming, Save Me Mr. Tako can be a little long in the tooth. Because the game does not feel particularly revolutionary in anything it does, that goal to replicate the past does come at a small cost. While levels are relatively quick to run through, they can feel somewhat repetitive when tackled in large chunks. Back in the days of Game Boy, experiences were often shorter because players couldn’t save their games or there simply wasn’t a need to protract things. But that shouldn’t necessarily be a fault of the game’s design, merely a reflection on how things used to be when compared to now.
Save Me Mr. Tako: Definitive Edition fulfills its specific goal of replicating a classic Game Boy platformer. Packed with levels, software limitations, and personality, any player with a soft spot for this time period in gaming will feel right at home. Those who missed the original in 2018 should find good quality of life improvements that make the Definitive Edition the perfect way to play Save Me Mr. Tako.
