Sneak Peek: Plushed - The Newest Great Platformer?

Plushed is an upcoming game from Blacksmith games, and if that name sounds familiar they are running the wonderful Appvent calendar. Plushed is their first entry into the App Store, and we first saw a video back in June, but now finally it was submitted a couple days ago. Let me take you away, the scene is set in a little girl’s bedroom, and she is reading a fairy tale with her plushed bunny. The little girl is absolutely in love with fairy tales, and one night as she is reading one she hears snoring from a mouse hole. She jumps from the bed to see what was the matter, bringing a left over piece of cheese. To her surprise an obese mouse appears in front of her, and devours the cheese. The mouse is so over joyed that it vows to grant one wish. No one sees the scrawny mouse just inside the mouse hole looking on in resentment. The girl immediately exclaimed, “Please! make me a fairy tale princess!” As the mouse is waving his wand, the scrawny mouse tosses a skull at the obese mouse deflecting the spell into the fairy tale book. The book then swallowed everyone in the room, and everything was brought to life including a faithful long eared companion. This sets the stage for the brand new adventure story that is Plushed. Right off the bat I can say that Plushed has a wonderfully deep story, and this main feature gives reason to keep playing to discover the ending. So it’s up to you playing as the reluctant bunny knight to save the little girl in a very dark fairy tale world, as the devlopers describes, “macabre.” You’ve heard the tale of saving the princess, but have never seen it like this. Also the story includes quite a bit of comedy poking fun at the typical rescue princess tale. Twenty deluxe characters are included with each having vary defined and unique personalities. Plushed doesn’t break any bounds in terms of platforming gameplay. What makes it stand out is the style of the game. The hand drawn art style of the elaborate backgrounds to each of the elaborate characters is superb. Nine long levels are included with multiple checkpoints along the way. Three boss battles have to be completed to rescue the princess. Controls are prototypical with a left right button, and tap to jump or the option to use tilt controls. Special shaking, and dragging of objects are featured as well. Playing through the game it has all of the platforming iPhone tactics we’ve come to see. The difference is that you truly feel transported to this different fairy tale world. You feel connected with this plush bunny not seen since the velvetine rabbit. Each level presents two challegnes to decide between collecting all of the gold ladybugs or to complete the level. The levels gives you many forks, and you have to decide if you want to collect all of the gold ladybugs. Aslo three unlockable mini games are included as a nice added bonus. Every single level gives you different characters to interact with. You will need to find items in the environment to use the characters to your advantage. You'll need to collect pizza or candy to guide characters into position, and get through blockades. One minor concern is that there is no negative for dying other than going back to the most recent checkpoint. Plushed was just submitted, and will be priced at $1.99 when it enters the App Store. We will have a full review once it’s released to see how it compares to the major platformers for the iPhone. See the developer's trailer below. [gallery link="file" columns="4"]

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