➤ Fascinating hostile lands 🎮

It is not often that we see titles created specifically for the mobile market being carried by weight in the context of traditional consoles. We are used to seeing the reverse process, with conversions, spin-offs or adaptations of successful games on consoles into titles for smartphones and tablets, which is practically taken for granted in the current market. But if a game born for mobile devices is transferred to real gaming machines, it usually means that it has achieved two main objectives: it has achieved truly extraordinary success and is characterized by a structure and a technical realization that would not disfigure on machines that are notoriously more performing, in front of a certainly more demanding public.

This last point is of particular importance, because the use of a title with the controller in hand and in front of the TV is necessarily different from what you usually have with a smartphone or tablet and only experiences of a certain level and of a certain depth can take the experienced player test. Badland had what it takes to take the plunge and this Game of the Year Edition demonstrates that the little creature of Frogmind has wings strong enough to fly even in much more difficult and selective territories than the App Store. The game therefore returns, a couple of years after its first appearance on mobile devices, in this form of a digital title for PC and console, with a new edition including the substantial expansions released after the original launch, that is Day II, Daydream, Doomsday and a cooperative and competitive local multiplayer sector, as well as a series of subtle but effective adjustments applied to the control system and consequently to the level design to make the game fit on the controller and on the new context of home consoles .

Clony returns in a vitaminized version on consoles and PC with Badland: Game of the Year Edition

A strange story

Badland's narrative is barely hinted at between its enigmatic levels, unfolding hermetically between the lights and shadows that characterize his graphic style, creating a fascinating aura of mystery and magic around the wandering of the strange winged creature that we find ourselves fluttering awkwardly among a thousand dangers. It is not difficult to see suggestions from Limbo within it, referring to that genre of games that mix melancholy and properly disturbing tones in bizarre and cynical interactive fairy tales.

All we need to know is that the creature, called Clony, must fly through many obstacles to save his world, apparently threatened by strange machinery that can be seen moving in the background, with a perceptible progression as it progresses through the levels as the day fades into night and the tones become more and more gloomy, hand in hand with an increase in the difficulty and danger that constantly surrounds the bizarre bird protagonist. What happens therefore must above all be intuited, while the succession of levels within the four macro-areas constituted by the various phases of the day is clear, starting from the morning, continuing in the middle of the day and then ending at dusk and finally arriving at night, in a crescendo of difficulty and gloom that gives a good idea of approaching the final stages of the challenge. The original version of Badland certainly did not stand out for a great longevity and even in this case the main campaign does not take a large number of hours to complete, but the Game of the Year Edition has undergone a considerable injection of content with the integration of the expansions released later on the mobile platforms and a rather rich multiplayer sector, even if only usable locally for up to four players. In total, according to reports from Frogmind, it takes about fifteen hours to complete all one hundred levels available for single player, in addition to one hundred levels in cooperative multiplayer and twenty-seven arenas for competitive multiplayer.

A close flight

The concept behind Badland is extremely simple, but its implementation on the screen is enriched with a series of variables to which a simple textual explanation cannot do justice, as befits a well-made puzzle game. It is a complex mechanism whose gears are designed to the millimeter in order to function properly, and the result is a balanced and deep game, despite its basic simplicity. Within forced scrolling levels, the aim is to reach the end of each section trying to avoid traps and obstacles. Clony is controlled by simply pressing a button (one of the front buttons or one of the triggers, at your choice) that makes the creature's wings flap, according to the setting directly borrowed from the original on the touch screen.

The transposition has inevitably lost that tactile synergy between the movement of the fingers on the screen and the flight of the protagonist that characterizes the mobile version, but in this reduction something has been gained in the introduction of control through the analog stick. Unlike the original, in this it is possible to give a direction to the flight of the creature, even if only in a hinted way, which has led to a slight but decisive general reorganization of the levels to accommodate this greater possibility of control. The first difficulty is represented by the need to learn to control Clony's flight, actually rather clumsy, which requires a precise dosage of pressure on the button (for this reason it is preferable to use the trigger, which allows a certain "play "on its run) to avoid obstacles and not lag behind scrolling. The control system, however, is enriched and complicated exponentially with the addition of the various power-ups present that can modify the behavior of the creature: speeding up, slowing down, amplifying the movements or ensuring a continuous rotation in contact with the walls or still allowing it to adhere to surfaces. There are also the size modifiers, which make Clony bigger or smaller and finally the fundamental possibility of creating different clones of the protagonist with which to increase the chances of survival within particularly difficult passages or to be divided on various paths for activate switches and ensure the passage and survival of at least one creature. The cynicism we talked about becomes evident in these situations, since the sacrifice of even a large number of clones is inevitable, when not really necessary, in order to keep even one creature going until the end of the level, although the game obviously rewards. the ability to bring as many clones to safety as possible.

Xbox One achievements

Badland: Game of the Year Edition really has a huge amount of unlockable achievements, which is 77 out of the usual 1000 points total for Gamerscore. Consequently, each goal involves a rather small amount of points and they are all distributed along a wide path that requires the achievement of various performances. The simple progress between the levels guarantees only a small part of the loot, which for the complete conquest pushes you to explore each game mode and try to behave in an extremely correct or even somewhat incorrect way.

Lights and shadows

The use of chiaroscuro, as already mentioned, immediately brings to mind Limbo and similar titles (Nifflas' NightSky may be another case in point), but the contrast between the dark silhouettes in the foreground of the protagonist and the sensitive elements of the scenario with the colorful and bright background creates a very special effect.

Following the game's tacit non-narrative, observing the colorful elements of the scenario, it is possible to guess what is happening in the bizarre world of Clony, as the light degrades from the soothing tones of the morning to the eerie darkness of a night full of mysteries. The Game of the Year Edition has undergone a further enrichment of the graphics sector with a complete remastering at 1080p but the backbone of the whole graphics sector is the particular style adopted by the team to represent the magical world of Badland. With no technological solutions of particular importance, the game immerses us in its world thanks to the hand-made drawings and the strength of those dominant colors in the background that create a violent contrast with the dark figures on which we are forced to focus our attention. The mobile matrix is evident in the relative simplicity of the technical sector, but the art direction, for once, frees the game from the narrow perimeter of smartphone production to distinguish it from the mass of titles even in the console and PC field. Forgetting about polygons, pixels and frame rates, the game captures us in its bizarre world with no frills or verbose presentations and although some graphics solutions are not entirely original it is evocative and memorable even in the midst of thicker productions. The audio sector contributes to the creation of the dreamlike and alien atmosphere with the accompaniment of only sound effects during the game phases and some rare music in the intermission phases.

Comment

Tested version Xbox One Digital Delivery Steam, PlayStation Store, Xbox Store, Nintendo eShop Price 11,99 € Resources4Gaming.com

8.7

Readers (6)

8.0

Your vote

While also presenting some critical discrepancies, characteristic of the comparison between the two worlds, Badland: Game of the Year Edition demonstrates that the best productions designed for the mobile market can easily shine even in the more traditional of consoles and PCs. The feeling of the tactile control, on which a good part of the original experience is based, is inevitably lost here, but Frogmind must be acknowledged for the great work carried out in adapting the controls with the addition of direction via analogue and consequent calibration of the levels. Even the extreme simplicity of the concept, which could be not very appealing outside the mobile environment, ceases to be a problem once you get to the heart of the action, confirming how the title has been perfectly adapted to the domestic experience. Too bad only for the relative brevity of the single experience, even in the face of an obviously higher price than the original.