Henry Hatsworth in the Puzzling Adventure

Henry Hatsworth is a very silly, yet really very good platform game for the DS that I bought ages ago and never beat.  Now that I'm coming to the end of this game, I thought I'd do a little bit on it.

The plot of this game is very simple.  A long long time ago, there was a suit that was so classy you could rule the world with it.  Some guy known only as The Gentleman ruled the world with this suit and when his time came to an end, he spread the suit all over the world to prevent anyone getting their hands on it and fucking everything up.  That's where you come in, as Henry Hatsworth, the extremely British adventurer as you must go gather all the bits of the suit.

Despite the stupid sounding plot of this game it's actually rather charming and doesn't really get in the way of the game in anyway.  There are a few cutscenes dotted between each world as an excuse to crack a few jokes but plot really isn't all that important in this kind of thing anyway.

You may be asking yourself right now, whats so "puzzling" about this adventure.  Well here's the thing, when you find the first bit of the suit, you open up a rift to the "puzzle dimension" and cause a load of monsters to start pouring out of it.  In game play terms, this means there is a upward scrolling field of coloured blocks in the bottom screen of your DS.  When you kill a monster, it doesn't die completely, it returns to the puzzle where you must then match it up with 2 other blocks of the same colour to get rid of it for good.  Any monsters that reach the top get another crack at trying to kill you before they blink out of existence.

The platforming in this game is really good too with some great level design and really tight controls.  There is also some room for some exploration as there are a number of secret levels that dole out some nice rewards if you bother with them.  On top of that there is a shop where you can buy upgrades for Henry which gives you good reason to actually take on enemies rather than just find ways to rush and avoid them.

I will say though this game is really fuckin' hard.  The platforming can be really tricky sometimes and the enemies will really do you over if you're not careful.  Also the secret levels are insane so if the main game is too easy for you, there is still something that will really challenge your platforming skills.

So if you didn't play this game when it was new, go find a copy.  Easily one of my personal favourite games on the DS.