Dewy's Adventure

Video games are all about empowerment, about wish fulfillment. Whether it's playing up front for England in the World Cup final (completely implausible, I know) or beating up a bunch of thugs single-handedly, they're basically about letting you do things you never could in real life.

So when we were offered the chance to play as a drip in Dewy's Adventure, we were a little underwhelmed. Some of us have been drips all our lives, so why would we want to play as one? But in Dewy's Adventure you really do play as a globule of H20, splashing your way around an assortment of fantastical worlds.

And so you set forth around the top-down open-plan levels, collecting gems, pounding enemies and leaping onto platforms through the judicious use of the direction keys and '5'. Each stage is lovingly constructed with bold, chunky sprites and filled with bright primary colours. It really is a joy to behold, with environments that range from sunny meadows to snowy peaks and dank caves.

Dewy is no ordinary drip either. With a press of '*' or '#' you can either raise or lower his body temperature, turning him into a chunk of ice or a cloud of vapour respectively. These imbue him with special abilities that allow you to traverse otherwise inaccessible areas. For example, some solid blocks can only be destroyed by a spot of lightening, which Dewy can project in vapour form.

This formula is neatly played with throughout the game. On certain occasions you'll be forced to take on one of your forms due to the level's climate. For example, on the icy levels you'll find your temperature gauge constantly slipping down, making it impossible to adopt your vapour form unless you find a handy hot spring.

Whilst it's a fairly undemanding game, Dewy's Adventure is full of neat little touches like this that raise it above a good number of similarly gentle, dare we say kiddie, adventure games. One thing that we did find a little grating was the controls. Dewy tends to slide around levels, as befits a drop of water, and it can prove rather tricky to steer him around with humble mobile controls. Small corrections and negotiating narrow pathways can be an absolute nightmare.

Fortunately the gentle pace and exploration-based gameplay eases such woes to a certain extent. Though you could race through many of the levels in no time at all, you'll have missed much of what the game has to offer. By travelling off the beaten path and venturing into all the nooks and crannies you'll encounter bonus items and a great sense of satisfaction.

Playing through Dewy's Adventure we were reminded of a number of games we'd played previously. There's not a lot that's original here, but the most noteworthy thing was that each of the games it reminded us of belonged on a bigger, more capable platform. Perhaps Dewy's Adventure's crowning achievement is that it feels like a handheld console game. From the quality of the production values (including the small hub that makes up the main menu screen) to the open levels, Konami has managed to squeeze an impressively realized world into 375KB of data.

You won't find anything startlingly fresh in Dewy's Adventure, but it's a thoroughly well put together slice of consoley adventuring. Frankly, we could do with a lot more of that on mobile.