This is a retro styled 2-D side scrolling shooter that takes inspiration from cutesy Namco titles like SkyKid and Ordyne.  Take control of a cat or dog piloting biplanes as you shoot down enemies in this game for Nintendo Switch and PC (Switch version reviewed here).

Play control is super simple.  Move around with the left stick.  Fire with the B button, and do a flip with the A button.  Flipping makes you invulnerable so you can avoid bullets, but you have to wait for a meter to fill before you can do it again.  Be careful, though, because this is one of those ‘one hit and you die’ kind of games.  If you get hit, you’ll dive and crash.  I wanted to be able to hit the flip button to pull out of a dive like you can in SkyKid, but you can’t do that here.

Sometimes another plane will zip by behind you and toss out a medal.  If you catch it, you’ll get a power up, like wider shots, bombs, and much more.  You can also collect power ups that just sit there in the stages.  And when you defeat enemies, you can pick up little crystals.  Every now and then a blimp shop will appear at the top of the screen.  Touch it to enter a shop where you can spend the crystals on even more power up weapons.  After you get a Game Over, you can use extra crystals you’ve collected to build up a little town, although this doesn’t really add anything to the gameplay.

In the options screen, you can toggle how many lives you have and the difficulty level.  You can play single player or two player co-op.  There is another option that lets you play single player while a second plane follows behind you, which gives you a little extra firepower.  Even with that, this game is super hard and once you lose all your lives, you have to start the stage over from the beginning.  Which made it more frustrating than fun for me, which is a shame because if the game were a little easier, I would’ve liked it much better.

Kid Factor:

Horgihugh and Friends is rated E-10 with an ESRB descriptor of Fantasy Violence.  You shoot all kinds of crafts and robots that just explode when defeated.  When you get hit, you just spin dive and crash.  Reading skill is helpful for some of the text, but not necessary just to play.  Younger gamers may find it too difficult, though.

Tags: Game Reviews