Henry Hatsworth in the Puzzling Adventure This instant

This game is amazing. If you're at all a fan of super polished, extremely charming sidescrollers (like Goemon or Strider or Kirby or Ristar or Rayman or Starfy or Mega Man) than stop reading and buy this game. I'm not even that big a fan of puzzle titles, and I gotta admit, the puzzle component to Henry Hatsworth had me hooked.

So the game is a sidescroller, but the bottom screen has a puzzle game constantly (slowly) going on. At any time, you can switch between which game/screen you're working on (while puzzling, the top screen is paused). As you do stuff in the platformer parts, you build up a bar that lets you stay in the puzzle game. And as you puzzle away, you earn powerups that take immediate effect in the platformer half. For example; clear a lightning block in puzzle mode, and when you return to the platformer part a lightning shock will paralyze all enemies on screen. There are tons of powerups, so you're encouraged to puzzle away, and since you only have to play it in short bursts, it gets quite addicting fast. It's frankly, brilliant. I can't believe no one has ever combined these two genres before! Let alone so well.

The game is gorgeous with personality to spare; this dude and his crazy, adventuresome, London-esque world (complete with his tea-time robot suit, and Union Jack anime-style swooshy background) is way too loveable. The art all around is great, with fantastic use of colors and loads of personalities for every character in the game. The gameplay is rock solid - this guy can platform with the best of them. The fighting is tight, responsive and rewarding, with nice amount of depth (juggles!). And the platforming is kept fresh with plenty of new moves. For example, once you find the Golden Gentleman's Trousers, you can do wall jumps - which comes in handy 'cuz you'll need 'em. The levels are really well designed. The game is fantastic!

It's original, it's charming, it's polished, it's unique - but most importantly it's fun as heck. I can't believe that Tiburon, the same EA studio responsible for Madden year in and year out, had the creativity and skill to put this together. If no one told me, I'd swear this was a long lost Konami or Capcom SNES game. It's fantastic.

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