Donut Dodo
Platform: Steam (reviewed), Switch, iiRcade, Atari VCS
Video games were once synonymous with the arcade game – those neon-drenched, electric havens defined the medium in ancient times. Fast-paced! Challenging! Simple but addictive! Such was the art’s primitive rubric when quarter-eating and compulsion were a game’s chief reason for existence. Today’s idea that games should provide experiences lasting hundreds of hours was an absurdist notion back then. But fast-forward forty years, the opposite is now true. Who cares about playing a 5-minute reflex-test when the average MMO can last a lifetime? When games can be split and spread across seasons of endless content?
Enter Donut Dodo, a retro-styled single-screen platformer crafted in the tradition of Donkey Kong, Burger Time, and even Pac-Man. These old-school classics kept their objectives simple, limiting goals to “collect all the trinkets!” or “reach the top!” Donut Dodo takes the former approach, having its little baker man scurry, climb, and jump through five multiple-tiered venues, from a mouse-ridden funhouse to a trap-laden candy store, collecting all the yummy pastries scattered throughout. As he proceeds, a giant dodo stands watch from above, spewing falling fireballs while guarding an even bigger (read: humongous) donut. The ultimate goal is to reach this king-sized confection, but it only becomes accessible once all the other foodstuffs have been snagged. After completing the final stage, the game repeats at a higher difficulty, rewarding players with the “true” ending should they prove victorious again.
In short, Donut Dodo feels like the lost classic it wants to be. The mechanics are simple but tricky, danger is everywhere, and death comes easily—a skilled distillation of that old-school “just-one-more-time” compulsion. Coupled with responsive controls, a catchy soundtrack, and graphics true to the era (if subtly superior), the game transcends being just a simple homage to a bygone age. Rather, it’s an argument for a type and style of art unfairly dismissed in the modern clime; a would-be revival in a gaming landscape now dominated by multi-million-dollar epics, free-to-play distractions, pay-to-win entrapments, and life-consuming MMOs.
Donut Dodo might not be a perfect game, but it’s a perfect reminder that not all games need to be competitive shoot-fests or world-encompassing excursions drenched in lore. Games are allowed to be quirky. Weird. Simple and whimsical.
While still being tons of fun.--D
Developer: pixel.games
Publisher: pixel.games
Release Date: June 3, 2022
Levels are set is the usual locations. You know, construction sites, amusement parks, haunted houses, and the like.
