At a glance...

Reviewer	Platform	Publisher	Developer	Players	Screenshots
Matt Bailey	Xbox 360	NinjaBee	J. Kenworthy Entertainment	1-2 (Split-screen)	Here
Requirements
None

Ancients of Ooga review

Ninja Bee's Cloning Clyde was one of my favourite games from the early days of Xbox Live Arcade (XBLA). Back then we had Geometry Wars and not a lot else to enjoy besides Ninja Bee's own Outpost Kaloki X, if you weren't a fan of retro games. Cloning Clyde was a quirky side-scrolling platformer developed in conjunction with J. Kenworthy Entertainment. Aside from the interesting visual style, its stand-out feature was the ability to control a number of clones of Clyde himself, who would work together in order to complete puzzles on the levels, such as multiple pressure triggers and pulling the right combination of levers.

Ancients of Ooga is the spiritual successor to that game, as Ninja Bee and J. Kenworthy return to give us another side-scrolling platformer with plenty of puzzles and multiple characters to control in order to solve them. While some of the basic mechanics and puzzles are familiar, they are all wrapped up in a fresh new setting - the tribes of the Ooganis. These creatures ignored the advice of their elders, sided with the evil Boolis, who in return, killed their chiefs and enslaved the Ooganis. As a friendly spirit, you're here to sort out this mess by taking direct control of Ooganis and attempting to get rid of the Boolis. As a spirit you get to control multiple characters, in the same way you could control multiple clones in Clyde, but it's much nicer here to see a range of characters rather than just a load of identical beings. There is also a variety of different types of Ooganis and with each tribe possessing their own abilities, you'll need to use to your advantage.

The adventures are set across a surprisingly long story-driven campaign with multiple villages, each made up of multiple levels, with cut-scenes linking the action. The game relies quite heavily on in-game tutorials, which can become a bit tiresome, but generally do well to let you know how to play the game and roughly what you need to be doing, without holding your hand all the way. The difficulty curve isn't particularly steep, but Ancients of Ooga does steadily provide you with new abilities and in return, new challenges to conquer. Using the right skills at the right time with the right tribe of Ooganis becomes a bit of a challenge, but it's all part of the intriguing gameplay. There are times when it can feel a bit repetitive, and some of the concepts aren't too distant from the previous game, but generally it's an enjoyable and original experience. The puzzles can certainly make you stop and think things through, and while the platforming itself doesn't require pixel-perfect accuracy, it does work fairly well; the only concern is that the 'depth' to the side-scrolling view (in a similar manner to LittleBigPlanet) can sometimes be a bit confusing when you're trying to collect items or pull switches.

So as well as offering a compelling puzzle-platform experience, NinjaBee again draw you in with an interesting visual style. It maybe hasn't moved forward from Clyde as much as the many of the more recent Xbox Live Arcade games have, but it's still a pretty game, with lush greenery, lots of fire-red lava, and detailed animations which provide life to the little on-screen creatures you spend so much time protecting. And sacrificing. But mostly protecting.

As well as an extensive single-player mode the game can be played in co-op, though unfortunately only in an offline split-screen capacity. In fact, the online competitive multiplayer of Cloning Clyde is gone, but as it appears we got a longer campaign in return, it would seem a worthwhile trade. There are online leaderboards which should encourage some level of replayability to each of the levels.

Altogether Ancients of Ooga is a wonderfully quirky and enjoyable experience. In fact, it really is rather quirky; did we mention it features vomiting? It makes much more sense in the game than in this review, so we recommend you check it out.

Ratings

Overall	A worthy successor to the excellent Cloning Clyde, providing an enjoyable and occassionally humourous experience. This quirky platformer could be more challenging and varied in places, but it's certainly worth the asking price of 800 Microsoft Points (£6.80).	8/10

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