Another hands-on with Henry Hatsworth in The Puzzling Adventure

We scored some hands-on time with the honourable Henry Hatsworth back in August, but as the game’s March release date approaches we thought we’d pop around to EA’s manor for a cup of Earl Grey, a shortbread biccie and another look at a near-ready build of the game. Pip pip, what?

As we discovered previously, Henry Hatsworth is shaping up to be a unique blend of platform-adventure and match-three puzzler.

As you make your way through the platform sections on the top screen, swiping at enemies with your explorer’s machete and leaping over spikey traps, an abstract grid of coloured blocks slowly creeps upwards on the bottom screen.

A press of ‘X’ pauses the action on the top screen and switches control to the puzzle element, where you need to drag blocks left and right in order to line up three or more of each colour.

Certain enemies you dispatch on your top-screen travels find their way onto the puzzle grid in block form, as distinguished by their twisted grins. If you don’t get rid of these quickly, they’ll return to haunt our Henry in his top screen exploits.

The two elements are linked in other ways too. For example, early on you’ll find yourself repeatedly pinned down by enemy gun turrets. By hitting ‘B’ whilst crouching you can let off a shot from your blunderbuss.

Now by themselves, these shots don’t pack much of a punch. Pop onto the puzzle screen whilst the shot is in mid-air, however, and a successful bout of colour-matching will increase the power of your discharged pot-shot considerably.

Such elements are vital as our intrepid explorer attempts to retrieve each item of a mystical golden outfit. Yes, you heard: a mystical golden outfit.

We were left to our own devices with the game this time around, so were able to pick up on the story a little more.

Our aging, upper-class hero is on a mission to locate a snazzy outfit imbued with mystical powers. Whilst it doesn’t pretend to be anything other than nonsense, the story scenes are rendered with considerable panache, with a healthy streak of humour running throughout.

Voices are rendered in a comical Peanuts-esque gabble, quips are made about our hero’s competence and tea is taken at the most inopportune moments - specifically just prior to our hero turning himself into a 20 foot-high rampaging robot.

The game is, as EA puts it, ‘quirky’. 'Down-right barmy', is the expression we’d use. But this charming oddness is underpinned by some rock-solid mechanics.

In fact, the assuredness of the action-platforming coupled with the bold visual style, breathlessly varied gameplay and hefty combat reminded me of the output of Treasure - in particular the Japanese developer’s forgotton GBA gem Astro Boy: Omega Factor. A promising sign indeed.

It will be interesting to see if EA can keep up the rate of fresh ideas throughout the entire game, or if what we’ve seen so far represents an early peak. Keep an eye out for our review of this extremely promising title nearer its release.