PETER HOSKIN: Pikmin 4 is top notch! These critters led me up the garden path (and I loved it)
Pikmin 4 (Switch, £49.99)
Verdict: Garden of earthly delights
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Stupid name, stupid game – or so I thought. In the past, I’ve never really got on with this series and its strange blend of cutesy visuals and often unforgiving, against-the-clock gameplay.
But now? Well, dash it, consider me a fully signed-up Pikman. It turns out that this fourth game is absolutely glorious – both a continuation of the series and a reinvention of what it’s all about.
Continuity first. You are still a tiny cosmonaut who is stuck on a planet that looks a lot like Earth and who has commandeered a bunch of even tinier, plant-like creatures – the pikmin themselves – into service.
You use them to unlock the bucolic landscape around you. You chuck ’em at any supersized insects in your way. It’s part puzzle, part strategic combat.
And what do you achieve? The satisfaction of exploring a thing, I guess. The maps in Pikmin 4 are literal gardens, full of overgrown paths to venture down and things to unearth. They look beautiful on Nintendo’s Switch.
A still from the Pikmin 4 Nintendo Switch game
Peter Hoskin says there are ‘awesome changes and additions’ to the game
You are a tiny cosmonaut who is stuck on a planet that looks a lot like Earth
Accompanying you now on your expeditions is a doglike creature called Oatchi
There are some changes and additions this time, large and small. Accompanying you now on your expeditions is a doglike creature called Oatchi, whose abilities add to your options. There are also new types of Pikmin, including a glowing, bioluminescent variant.
But by far the biggest and best change is the removal of the restrictions of old, so that you don’t need to explore these maps within a certain number of ‘days’ or with a constant eye on your supply levels. It makes all the difference, like we’re finally enjoying this series as nature intended – serenely and boundlessly.
So Pikmin 4, then. Stupid name, wonderful game.
Manic Mechanics (Switch, £19.99)
Verdict: Sofa-bound chaos
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Did you ever play Overcooked? That brilliant game from about seven years ago that had you and your friends – shoulder to shoulder on the sofa – controlling different chefs in cramped, hazardous kitchens while trying to make meals within a time limit?
Well, Manic Mechanics is Overcooked… except with cars and from a different set of developers. In its enjoyably silly world, vehicle parts are constantly spilling down conveyor belts, and you need to grab them and fit them in just the right order. Quick, quick, quick!
What else is there to say? It’s certainly fun, if not quite Overcooked levels of fun. And it makes the most of its setting, with plenty of distinct, jeopardous subtasks – inflate this tyre (quickly!), repaint this bonnet (quickly!) – on the way to completing the main task of fixing the car or submarine or whatever.
The character at the centre of the Manic Mechanics game
Peter Hoskin says Manic Mechanics is like the game Overcooked… except with cars and from a different set of developers
Mr Hoskin describes it as an ‘enjoyably silly world’
There are plenty of distinct, jeopardous subtasks – inflate this tyre (quickly!), repaint this bonnet (quickly!)
Oh, and while you can play Manic Mechanics by yourself, it’s definitely best done (either in person or online) with (up to three of) your mates. Although if they’re not very good, so help me God, they might not stay your mates for much longer.
In fact, in some of the later, more challenging levels it feels as though cooperative play is the only way forward. It’s almost a paradox: you need other people to help out, but other people only leads to more chaos, as you’re all bustling around, getting in each other’s way.
But that paradox is, of course, the point. As Manic Mechanic’s name suggests, chaos is written into the gameplay. Just like Overcooked.
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