Overall, there’s not a lot to dislike about Yoku’s Island Express. It’s deep, it’s fun, and while the main character may not be memorable as a Rayman or a Mario, the gameplay is so well-planned that you aren’t in need of a strong lead character to make it all work. Villa Gorilla did one helluva job with this release and it’s a game that shouldn’t be overlooked.
Platformers typically follow the same formula when being designed. You run, jump, move from left to right, and achieve a goal only to be transported into another stage that is more of the same. Don’t get me wrong, it’s not a bad formula at all, as classics like Super Mario Bros. and Lode Runner prove the longevity of such a genre can exist with such simplicity.
That said, and beyond great classics, platformers can become more of the same from game to game, especially when it comes to indie developers, as quite a few feature pixelated characters simply put into a platformer environment that looks like it could have been made for a flash-based gaming environment (not a knock, just something I noticed over the years). Much like the big companies, such as EA, when a company sees a template that works, sometimes they go with it to almost guarantee success. Unlike the EAs of the world, indie companies depend on success and getting it right without taking too many chances, as it could mean the end of the company if the game doesn’t work out. So, when a company sees a platformer that works, why not just do the same to build towards a more creative project? Having a blueprint for success is invaluable for a company that is working project to project. At this point, I bet you think I’m setting you up to give you an example of such a cookie-cutter game that is guaranteed to succeed because it doesn’t take chances. Jokes on you, this ain’t that game and this ain’t that review.
Yoku’s Island Express seemed, at least in their YouTube trailer, more like a platformer that I had seen before in dozens of games prior. It looked cartoony, overly cute, and didn’t seem to offer much on the surface, in the trailer. Thankfully, it was only a couple of those things, cartoony and overly cute. The game actually includes complicated and methodical gameplay design, which was so pleasantly surprising. It was so unique that it felt like a part of Ubisoft’s Rayman, which includes some of the best platformer design available.
Anyway, let’s discuss Villa Gorilla’s fun platformer and why you’ll be hard-pressed to put the controller down.
The story revolves around a beetle, whom I believe to be a dung beetle (they never say it outright, but the beetle is rolling a ball around the entire game, so, you know, dung beetle). He is attached to a white ball (via a string) and has been hired as the new postmaster for a tropical island. His purpose? He needs to deliver mail/packages to different creatures… also, he has to help find the reason why the island’s God has been literally scarred by an unknown presence. If the God becomes weak or dissatisfied, then that could mark the end of the island and its inhabitants. This is heavy stuff for a newly hired postmaster beetle to handle, but handle it ye shall.
The crux of the gameplay just revolves around the beetle finding mailboxes to deliver mail and solving minor bumps in the road. It’s nothing too frustrating or difficult, as most puzzles consist of simply uncovering items and gaining additional access to portions of the stage. For example, you collect fruit along the way, which equal out to special access (that costs a certain amount of fruit) to areas, which progress the game. The access you pay for in the game grants you the use of bumpers on the levels. These bumpers are straight from a pinball machine. When you’re on one you can be lifted into the air towards other bumpers or objects. The bumpers are controlled by the trigger buttons on the Xbox controller and are separated by color (blue = left trigger, orange = right trigger). You will find bumpers all over the island and some, like the aforementioned, cost a certain amount of fruit to access. That’s around 80% of the game and its well-spent percentage.
Staying with the bumpers, you will literally access parts of the game that become nothing more than a pinball machine in the long run. You read that right, you have pinball integrated with a platformer. It sounds absolutely odd, and gimmicky on paper, but it works remarkably well thanks in part to good level design. The structure that the developers put together to work in this beetle, his ball, and flippers/bumpers is nuts but done incredibly well. For example, you will have a series of differently curved crevices at times that you have to get the beetle/ball into, via pinball methods, to unlock certain crystals (you will run into purple crystals that unlock passageways), which unlock certain areas to progress. All of the pinball portions of the game are designed and executed with methodical design into the platformer foundation of this game. I’m pretty sure that if Villa Gorilla just put out a pinball game, then it would have been equally as impressive, but somehow they have integrated pinball in as an element to progress the narrative and to provide an additional platformer challenge to the gamer. Because of this mixture, Yoku’s Island Express was a game that I had a hard time putting down. There are not a lot of platformers out there that could do this to me. I’m so numb to the genre because I’ve been playing these games since the 80s, so it was refreshing seeing a new take on it. It was quite the risk mixing such a genre with an ancient form of entertainment like pinball, but it pays off.
When you’re not playing pinball, then you have a straight-up platformer that has the essence and wackiness of Rayman, even down to the animation execution and style. You have a bevy of different personalities you run into during gameplay, including a gang of misfits, a man stuck in a tree, and a magician, who come with their own quest for the beetle to complete. The characters also feature their own style that is visually representative of their pocket of stories and other narrative components that point back to the main storyline. Including these different types of characters and their unique type of story helps to alleviate any potential staleness that usually comes with platformers.
Beyond specific characters you meet up with, the gameplay also offers up some non-linear tasks to achieve on your own. For example, there is a part of the game where you have several dark blocks gumming up the path our beetle needs to go. To unclog/destroy those blocks, you have to capture explosive slugs (you read that right) and explode the dark blocks to open up new paths to explore. You don’t gain explosive slugs until a little later in the game, but there are several different abilities that you gain, including diving deep underwater — you’ll want that one, as you go through it that will have you backtracking (in a good way) and exploring areas that you had to previously pass up because you couldn’t get through them. This creates not the only motivation for the player to explore all facets of the levels, but also creates a sense of exploration that generally doesn’t exist in typical platformers. The game keeps you in its bubble of exploration for a long time and, more importantly, keeps the content fresh through abilities and discovery.
Overall, there’s not a lot to dislike about Yoku’s Island Express. It’s deep, it’s fun, and while the main character may not be memorable as a Rayman or a Mario, the gameplay is so well-planned that you aren’t in need of a strong lead character to make it all work. Villa Gorilla did one helluva job with this release and it’s a game that shouldn’t be overlooked.
