Toki Tori Review

What came first, the chicken or the egg? Well in Toki Tori the chicken came fist, to save all his little egg friends.

Toki Tori is a classic puzzle platform dating back to it’s original, critically acclaimed, title for the Gameboy color way back in 2001. In this game you play the part of a large yellow chicken named Toki Tori. Your job is to save all the eggs that have been scattered all over the magical Toki Tori world. To do so you will need to plan your route carefully, avoid obstacles and enemies, and use a variety of fun & useful tools.

Toki Tori may have started it’s life on the Gameboy Color, but the version of the iPhone is a far cry from it’s younger cousin. While the gameplay may be similar the graphics and gameplay have had tremendous updates. In fact, the iPhone version appears to be ported over from the very popular Wii Ware version of the game.

Toki Torki has 4 very different worlds you play in: Forrest Falls, Creepy Castle, Slimy Sewer, and Bubble Barrage. Each world has 10 levels to complete to move on to the next stage. In addition each world also has “Hard” levels. These aren’t required to move on but are there to offer more challenging levels for the more advanced puzzler.

The Good

The polish of this game is incredible. Looking from the Wii title to this one there seems to be no difference in the game except controls, and screen ratio. The animations are as sooth as butter and the levels are varied and colorful. Toki Tori is one of a handful of iPhone titles that actually makes your iPhone feel like a legitimate gaming console.

I love the art style. I have to admit, when I first laid eyes on that fat, fluffy, chicken I knew we were meant to be together. The characters in the game have been drawn with serious consideration and it shows. Even the levels have an incredible level of detail, looking very different from each other while still keeping with the same art style. As you move from forests to haunted castle, and from sewers to underwater, you will marvel at the artwork the whole way through.

The levels cover a wide range of challenge and variety. Casual, and hardcore puzzlers will find tons of gameplay to keep them satisfied. Not just because there are almost 70 levels to play, but because each one has different tools and environmental challenges to deal with. For example, Bubble Barrage world is played completely underwater and you have to concern yourself about where to get air as you move around. Also as you go through the game you get many many tools to help you on your way. These include, bridges, teleporters, slug suckers, ice guns, and more. This keeps Toki Tori consistently fresh and fun.

The Bad

It’s really hard to find a bad point for this game. One thing that makes it especially difficult is the iPhone platform itself. If this were being played on a normal portable platform Toki Tori would easily get 5 stars, but because we are talking about a platform with so many new capabilities we like to see games take advantage of the iPhone’s unique features. With Toki Tori for example I would at least have liked to have seen some online features like downloadable levels or online leader boards.

I haven’t played the Wii version, so I don’t know if these are the same levels or not. If you have played the Wii version and are looking at this title, you may want to look closely and make sure your not just getting the same game again.

The Bottom Line

Toki Tori is a full console experience on your iPhone. From the graphics and gameplay, to game-length and features this game is pound for pound as good as the Wii game. If you are interested in platform puzzlers at all you will absolutely love Toki Tori.

Presentation & Graphics

Everything in the graphics department is perfect.