For this week's iPhone Friday i tried POINPY, from Ojiro Fumoto and Devolver Digital, on my iPhone 14 Pro.
It wasn't until after i played POINPY that i knew that the game had been re-released. i can't say i knew about the game before i started, but i did know Downwell and have it so as this game was from the same person i wanted to see what they came up with.
The App store page made it clear that this is a free to play game with no ads. the store page also mentioned about the game using a tip system for those interested. but i was surprised that inside the game itself there was no mention of this. i stumbled upon the tip feature rather than having the game point it out.
POINPY doesn't really explain that much about itself. the tutorial shows how the basic controls work but when you start the game it frustratingly adds elements not in the tutorial. this is probably a sign of the game's real age as it came out in 2022. the best games nowadays will have mini tutorials or information about the new stuff as we uncover it. here, there's nothing. this applies to the left and right of the screen. i'm sure i might've discovered them by accident, i only aimed right to see if the rabbit was something i could interact with.
It feels like POINPY has been re-released with little to no modernisations. the gameplay idea is still great, which is why i recommend it. but what's been built around it already feels a little dated and has been done better by quite a few games. it's unclear if there'll be any other updates to POINPY or if it's just been re-released as is. i've checked the latest press release i have for the game and it's not clear.
So as a quick pick up and play game, POINPY is good. but it falls behind the better games released nowadays with it's dated tutorial and general lack of information. this "souls-like" approach was more common on consoles whereas on mobile it's much less common now.
Version ? Played (Launch version)
