Developer: Right Nice Games, Grip Digital
Publisher: Grip Digital
Platforms: PC, PlayStation 4, Xbox One
Tested on: PlayStation 4
Skylar & Plux: Adventures on Clover Island – Review
It’s like there’s a revival of bright colored antropomorphic main protagonists in video games going on. There’s Crash Bandicoot remaster coming up, Yooka Laylee, which is a tribute to Banjo Kazooie, and now Skylar and Plux: Adventures on Clover Island, which seems to take notes from Jak and Daxter. With one exception -Banjo Kazooie-, all these games were PlayStation exclusives. Skylar and Plux: Adventures on Clover Island isn’t quite an exclusive as it’s available on PlayStation 4, Xbox One and PC.
Story
You are Skylar. Not the wife of Walter White, but a catlady that has been experimented on and has been modified in such a manner that she’s become the perfect murder maker. She doesn’t however feel the same about how much her victim’s lives are worth, so she breaks out of the facility and finds out who made her and what she can do to alter her fate. On her journey she stumbles upon Plux, a bird whose father went awol and for whom he’s been waiting for years. Together they fight against CPR, who has stolen an item that keeps the islands defense system in check. When CPR stole the item, the other two who make up the set were scattered and it’s up to you and Plux to get those items back and restore balance to the island. The story has a sugary ending and it sets it up for a sequel.
Graphics
The graphics of Skylar & Plux: Adventures on Clover Island are a massive throwback to the older games where a cast of colorful protagonists roam a set of diverse sceneries to thwart the plan of a rather comically evil mastermind. There are 4 different worlds in Skylar & Plux: Adventures on Clover Island, apart from the overworld. There’s a frozen land, an industrial area, a desertscape and a futuristic spacestation level. So there’s no shortage of interesting locales for you to explore. You can see that the developers really loved creating these microcosms. The levels feel short, which shows just how fun they are to play. Levels tend to promote exploration with different collectibles for you to go for a completionist run of the game.
Sound
Skylar & Plux: Adventures on Clover Island has a solid base when it comes to the sounds. There’s the rather fun and upbeat soundtrack and the voice acting is also done rather well. It has to be said though that the writing might be a little too ‘sacharine’ for some tastes, but the voice acting is on par and manages to make the characters into such hyperboles that it overshoots its goal of overdramatizing to make it amusing again to listen to.
Gameplay
Skylar & Plux: Adventures on Clover Island is an action/adventure game with platforming elements. It also has some metroidvania gameplay with backtracking once you’ve unlocked some upgrades.
The control scheme is quite easy, jump, double jumping and running around, once you unlock some upgrades you can equip them and use them to solve some puzzles to progress. There’s a time manipulating upgrade, a magnetic manipulation upgrade and a jetpack upgrade. You’ll unlock one of these in every world, and you’ll be able to backtrack and try out other routes to unlock more cages to get more health. Unlocking these cages is done with the shards you collect when you explore the levels. Enemies are mostly easy to beat by spinning into them or slamming down on them just like Crash Bandicoot or Jak would do. Unlocking the cages however is completely optional. When you unlock a certain amount of cages you’ll be able to get a health upgrade. With all the power upgrades to the glove it could be a hotbed for immerging gameplay, that however isn’t the case. Skylar & Plux: Adventures on Clover Island is a very straightforward game.
The game is very, very short. The whole game, if you play it without going for the completionist run or the platinum trophy, can be finished in a little over an hour and a half. It also only has one single boss. Which is a shame, because every level having its own boss would make the game quite a bit more interesting. As it stands now, the whole game feels like a set up for a far deeper story and the possibility to add more gameplay. It’s a shame that all the creativity in the world could have put into the game and the developers dropped the ball on that one.
The game is aimed at a younger demographic and it shows. This is often not a bad thing because even adults can enjoy these games. Skylar & Plux: Adventures on Clover Island is a game you have to play with that mindset, because else the experience won’t impress you.
Conclusion
Skylar & Plux: Adventures on Clover Island is a game that bounces good voice acting with vibrant colours and interesting locales to create a fun platforming game that you can play for five minutes and make it feel like you are actually progressing. It is however very short. Price/content ratio is a bit skewed on the pricey side of the spectrum, and even though it’s a game that won’t offend anyone and will please mostly anyone, makes it something to look into if you want an easy to play and easy to master game. Just as long as you don’t mind a very, very sugary sweet story. Just keep your insuline shot ready.
Skylar & Plux: Adventures on Clover Island - Review,
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