Sometimes it pays to be a little weird. In a market as busy, constant, and over-saturated as gaming, it’s rare but nevertheless refreshing to find a game that’s truly unique. Often uniqueness comes from true innovation in game design, defining a new genre, or re-inventing a classic formula. Other times, uniqueness comes simply in the form of something so strange, so quirky, and loveably surreal that it enters a league all of its own.
Enter CHUCHEL, a bizarre puzzler described by its developer, Amanita Design as a “comedy adventure game”. With a backlog of games like Machinarium and Botanicula under its belt, it’s no surprise that Amanita has made CHUCHEL equally defining in its stark difference to anything that’s come before.
The game sees you control Chuchel, a loud orange hairy…thing, on his quest to retrieve a cherry. Across the way, you’ll meet an all-sorts cast of bizarre, weird and colourful characters with whom you must interact in a variety of ways in order to unfold the continuously baffling plot.
Help Chuchel to chase down the mysterious villain and retrieve his cherished cherry! Outsmart the Pool Monster, escape frenzied Pac-Men and master the bird race. Join forces with Chuchel’s buddy Kekel and show the mischievous Chrchel that stealing cherries is wrong.
CHUCHEL Trailer YouTube Description
CHUCHEL was originally released for PC and Mac in 2018, but next year it will finally be making its home console debut on the Nintendo Switch. The game is filled to the brim with delightfully wacky and absurdist humour, with characters constantly yelling gibberish, spouting creatures from their heads, bashing each other with trees, piloting strange contraptions and well….yelling more gibberish. In a sense that game plays out like a weird interactive cartoon, which to be fair is something we’ve always secretly wanted to experience.
To compare it to something already existing would be a fool’s errand, but since I am a fool with a surplus amount of errands to run, the best thing I can describe it to would be a strange mix of LocoRoco, Rayman, and McPixel, with a hint of Aardman, and anything Keita Takahashi’s ever laid hands on. The game even has a few nods to other games, with some puzzles mirroring both Space Invaders and Angry Birds, only in a much more silly style.
RedDeer.games are responsible for porting and publishing the game, which will be arriving in the eShop in 2022. The game received great critical acclaim back in 2018, so we have no doubt that this port will be as equally enjoyable, and as equally absurd.
Will you be picking up CHUCHEL? Did you play the original version a few years back? Let us know in the comments!
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