Ittle Dew 2+ (NSW) Review

Yesterday evening saw a look at a Legend of Zelda-like adventure with Blossom Tales: The Sleeping King. Moving from sprites to polygons, Ittle Dew 2+ is also a Nintendo Switch game, this time a retail release, that sports a similar overhead perspective while offering 3D models for characters and environments. Here's SuperPhillip Central's review.

"Dew" not miss out on this action-adventure delight.

I adored Ittle Dew 2 when it originally released on the PlayStation 4 in digital form. The game's developer had plans to see if it could work on the Wii U, where no doubt a Legend of Zelda-loving audience would eat such a game up, but alas, the hardware just couldn't muster it. However, a year and some change later, the developer has the game ported to the Nintendo Switch, and with their publishing partner Nicalis, an enhanced version of Ittle Dew 2 sees a retail release in addition to a digital Nintendo eShop one. It's time to depart on a new adventure, dear readers!

Adventurers Ittle and her winged dog Tippsie travel along the high seas on a raft, when all of a sudden it crashes upon an uncharted island. Meeting the island caretaker, the two are told to head back to wherever they came from, but before this is done, Ittle notices a map that falls out of the caretaker's pocket. It reveals the location of eight dungeons around the island where the raft pieces are located. Not heeding the caretaker's words, the pair of adventurers heads off to explore their temporary island residence, searching the countryside for secrets, treasure, caves, and dungeons to enjoy themselves in. Ittle Dew 2+'s story is quite meta in its dialog and story, oftentimes poking fun at concepts seen in games like The Legend of Zelda and the many other titles that have been inspired by Nintendo's historic gaming franchise. It makes for some hilarious, tongue-in-cheek dialog and a story that I truly appreciated. It's nice to not have a super serious story for once for a game like this.

Explore the island well, Ittle; there are secrets all over the place.

The first dungeon is marked on the map for players at a nearby location. However, there's no rule that says you have to go there right away or that you have to enter that dungeon first. Of the eight dungeons in Ittle Dew 2+, only the eighth requires you to reach it with all of the previous seven raft pieces. Every other dungeon is free to enter at your leisure. Creating your own order of dungeons has a positive and a negative. For a positive, when you acquire a later dungeon's item and go to an earlier dungeon, you have opportunities for shortcuts to make your trip through it much easier. However, entering dungeons out of order also means that you have a longer distance to travel with more difficult enemies inside and outside a dungeon meant for you to tackle later. The puzzles inside are more complicated as well.

Nonetheless, it's not just dungeons that are open for exploration. Littered and sprinkled around the island are caves, and many of these require a trick to open. Thankfully, they can all be opened with just Ittle's starting weapon, a stick. Some are right out in the open, while others may require a hint from one of the many NPCs occupying the island. With the Nintendo Switch's screenshot functionality, there's no more need to write down these hints or remember them for later. Just hit the screenshot button, and you've got a hint saved in your screenshot folder via the Switch home menu.

The caves all have some kind of treasure inside to make finding cave worthwhile. Some house crayons that add a quarter of health to Ittle's row of hearts, some have lockpicks to open locked dungeon doors without the need for a key, some have secret shards that unlock optional, demanding dungeons, while some special caves have magical doors that transport Ittle to a completely uncharted area of the island, usually requiring a lot of skill to complete them and acquire the special treasure inside at the end.

The stick was cute, but now we're getting somewhere with Ittle's sword!

Ittle comes across a great amount of items within her and Tippsie's adventure. Rather than just ape the items from Ittle Dew 2+'s inspiration, The Legend of Zelda, the game instead comes up with four original items that each have a number of uses. The most basic is Ittle's stick, used as a sword. While it's not much to look at at the beginning of the game, she can level it up (e.g. making the stick turn into a sword at level 2 and then a fireball-shooting mace at level 3) by acquiring the upgrades in treasure chests. Other items mapped to each face button of the Switch controller include a Magic Rod that can hit things from across the screen, Dynamite to blow certain objects up, and an Ice Ring that creates frozen blocks that slide along the ground when pushed. All of these items can work together to solve more particularly taxing puzzles within Ittle Dew 2+.

For instance, in a room where Ittle must activate a northeastern crystal to open a door, if the crystal is guarded by spikes with no means to hit it up close, perhaps spawning an ice block, cutting it in half so the lower right diagonal half of it is gone, and then pushing it diagonally northwest into a corner might start something good. Then, at the bottom left corner of the screen, Ittle can use her rod to shoot a blast of energy out that deflects off the diagonal ice block at an angle and hits the crystal, opening the door. The fun about Ittle Dew 2+ and its puzzles is that there are usually two or more methods of solving them through smart item utilization. Having the player limited to just four items like Ittle Dew 2+ has doesn't mean that there's a limited amount of actions you can do with them. This makes the design on display with Ittle Dew 2+ so brilliant in this regard.

Push blocks like this from afar with the help of the Magic Rod.

And it doesn't end there with the clever design of Ittle Dew 2+ either. Beyond the meta terminology and dialog of the game, beyond the abundance of compelling exploration to be found throughout the world map, beyond going to dungeons in any order you want, and beyond the smart puzzle design with multiple means to solve them, there is an item system in place that makes it so depending on what items you already have in your possession, the special treasures in dungeons and in the special secret caves change to make it so you're not acquiring them horribly out of order. That's to say that you'll never get a level 3 batch of Dynamite before you get a level 2 batch of Dynamite. Even things like chains that allow Ittle's stick and later mace to have an extended reach or bandannas that allow Ittle more split seconds of invincibility when rolling are acquired in a clear order. With a game with as much freedom as Ittle Dew 2+ from such a smaller developer than Nintendo, it's amazing what Ludosity accomplished here with this game.

Retreat won't look good on an adventurer's resume, but neither would dying to the first enemy in Pepperpain Prairie that Ittle encounters!

If there's anything I have to object to with Ittle Dew 2+ is that while playing it on the Nintendo Switch Joycon controller, I had to switch between using the analog stick and the D-Pad. I needed the analog stick for general movement, but the D-Pad offered better aiming with items and more precise walking, especially on tile-wide pathways over bottomless pits. The Switch Joycon analog stick just isn't precise enough for delicate movements. I fell off enough twisty, turn-filled, narrow platforms to last me a winged dog's lifetime.

New to Ittle Dew 2+ is a collection of five dungeons found in the Dream World, a place Ittle and Tippsie are taken to once they nap in a sleeping bag within the town. The Dream World can be entered at any time, no matter if you have all of the items in the game or not, as these Dream World dungeons supply you with all you need to complete a specific dungeon. These are primarily puzzle-driven dungeons that are the hardest within the game to wrap one's brain around and solve. The rewards for solving these dungeons aren't anything important to the main quest. Instead, they're merely collectible cards with information on the various foes Ittle encounters within the world of Ittle Dew 2+.

The world of Ittle Dew 2+ is quite beautiful to look at. The 3D character models and environments are colorful and hold a lovely cel-shaded style, making everything pop out like a fairy tale world. The character designs are creative, but I really want to get into the environmental design for a second. It's bursting with creativity, especially the dungeons. From pillow forts, to submerged basements filled with underwater foes, to mines that grow and produce potassium, these places are mighty creative and far more innovative than "Oh, the fire dungeon. Oh, the water dungeon." Each dungeon has a take on a modern-day concept like a basement or house that makes for some clever dungeon concoctions.

Don't worry -- like these fire-spewing enemies, Ittle has brought the heat to this dungeon, too.

Last but not least, the music of Ittle Dew 2+ is fantastic. It offers live instruments in a wide variety of genres, moods, themes, and more. There aren't too many indie games that I absolutely love listening to outside of my actual play-through, but Ittle Dew 2+ was definitely one of them. High praise coming from a picky person like myself.

Ittle Dew 2+ takes a familiar formula with The Legend of Zelda and goes wild with it, offering an abundance of humor, meta commentary, and just phenomenal gameplay and design to back it all up. This isn't a Yooka-Laylee situation where the developers made fun of games they were inspired by, yet committed some of the same sins they poked fun at. (That said, I adored Yooka-Laylee, but that was an obvious issue with the game.) While some movement issues and repeated boss battles bring the overall experience down, the 12 original, well-designed dungeons included within the game, over 50 individual caves to find and plunder, and five all-new, particularly challenging dungeons set in the Dream World for this special bonus edition of Ittle Dew 2, makes for a game that is highly recommended for any action-adventure fan. You should definitely do the Dew.

[SPC Says: B+]

Ittle Dew 2 (PS4, XB1, PC) Review

We start the week with a brand-new review. This time, we're taking a look at Ittle Dew 2 from Ludosity, which just launched this past week. The PlayStation 4 version is the one I played for this review, but the experience should be similar across all platforms. Here's the SuperPhillip Central review.

Thank goodness for shipwrecks!

The Legend of Zelda is one of my favorite video game franchises of all time. It's such a historic and progressive series that has such a delightful formula that is rather tough to nail down. It's any wonder why many developers don't even try. However, we've seen a rise in the Zelda-like thanks to various indies. One such indie, Ludosity, already has a Zelda-like quest under its belt with Ittle Dew. Now, the sequel has launched with a 3D makeover, offering an adventure that will make you laugh as much as it makes you ponder how to solve that particularly daunting next puzzle!

Marooned yet again on an island, the duo of heroes, Ittle, a strong-willed girl always ready for an adventure, and her companion, a cheeky fox-like creature named Tippsie, find themselves in uncharted territory once more. There mission is already set in stone... er... I guess wood would be a better word to use, as the two need to find eight wooden raft pieces to craft an escape from the mysterious and hazard-filled island they find themselves on.

We wouldn't have a game if that wasn't the case!

The humor is abundantly apparent within the first few minutes of Ittle Dew 2. Asking Ittle if simply cutting down a tree would be smarter in order to build a raft, Ittle simply states matter-of-factly that "rafts don't grow on trees." The constant winking, lampshading, and mocking of video game and action-adventure game tropes remains from the original Ittle Dew, and it's still as funny and chuckle-worthy as ever.

The adventure is as awesome as ever, too. Ittle Dew 2 challenges you with moving Ittle through an open overworld map connected by zones that house different locales, enemies, obstacles, and challenges. The eight raft pieces are conveniently placed in dungeons spread around the world map. A great part of Ittle Dew 2 is that you need no tackle these dungeons in any order, save for the final one that unlocks once the previous seven raft pieces have been collected. Doing this makes it so multiple playthroughs need not give you the same experience. You can shake and vary things up, which makes repeated plays of Ittle Dew 2 feel vastly different from each other.

Each zone in Ittle Dew 2 feels like its own special place.

Beating dungeons out of order isn't necessarily too big of an issue. Sure, enemies attack stronger and harder if you don't have upgraded weapons and defensive equipment, but you usually can strong-arm your way through the dungeons thanks to the generous checkpoint system and dungeon design. Losing all of Ittle's hearts in a dungeon takes you back to the beginning of the dungeon. However, because the design of dungeons never fails to have it where you're able to open up shortcuts and portals that allow quicker access to deeper parts of said dungeons.

Dungeons house the most amount of puzzles within Ittle Dew 2, and from the beginning dungeons, the puzzles are relatively elementary affairs to complete. Push a block on this switch, step on the other switch to open the door, boom! As you progress in the game and reach later dungeons (or, as I mentioned, if you just go out of order), you'll find that you'll discover truly brain-busting puzzles. What puzzles you faced earlier in your adventure that took no more than ten seconds to figure our the solution to will feature puzzles later in Ittle Dew 2 that can take you ten minutes just to wrap your head around the concept of what the developers want you to do. They're never impossible to solve or have unfair solutions. You'll never feel like you were cheated or mislead. Instead, if you think about how to use four main items you're eventually equipped with, each mapped to one face button, and how to combine their uses to solve puzzles, you'll figure out the solutions.

Stepping on four buttons in order isn't usually too taxing a challenge,
but it is when you've got enemies in your way.

The four weapons that Ittle comes across in the various dungeons of Ittle Dew 2 can also be found in special portals that take you to uncharted destinations not even on the world map. These portals usually house combat or movement challenges in order to acquire a treasure of some type. Many times you'll find one of the four weapons of the game, but if you already have the original, whether you found it in a dungeon or in a portal area first, you'll gain an upgraded version of that weapon. Both weapons as well as special defensive equipment like headbands can be upgraded up to three times through finding them in dungeons or in the wild. Thus, making the process of going out of the recommended order of dungeons much easier to accomplish.

These four weapons in Ittle Dew 2 come in the form of a standard stick that can eventually launch fireballs from its tip regardless of Ittle's health. There's also a wand that shoots balls of magic that can interact with faraway objects and trigger mechanisms like crystals that open doors in dungeons. Then there's dynamite which serves as Ittle Dew 2's version of The Legend of Zelda's generic bombs. Finally, there's an ice ring that can freeze enemies and create one ice block that can be slid across the ground. This is great for summoning an ice block to hold down a button while Ittle stands on the other, successfully unlocking a door in the process.

I don't know what is more dangerous to Ittle here-- the skeletons or the bitter cold!

Ittle Dew 2's puzzles don't just hang out in the eight dungeons of the game. No, the entire world map is littered in the greatest sense of the word with secret caverns and hidden areas. Some are as simple to access as striking a peculiar object or section of wall while others require some deeper thought. Whether it's standing still by a barrel for a few seconds to reveal a hole, hitting a series of pillars in a certain order, or escorting a ghostly spirit to its resting place, there are many clever solutions to uncovering caves. Thankfully, a lot of these secrets have NPCs within the world that don't mind sparing a hint towards them. Additionally, many of the secret caves can become marked on your map by finding special scrolls that reveal some of the caverns' locations. These secret areas are worth investigating, too, as many house the aforementioned portals leading to helpful treasure, to health-boosting Crayon Boxes, and even special shards that when many have been collected, open up three of hidden dungeons across the world map.

Most caves house a short but sweet puzzle to solve to make you really earn your reward.

These hidden dungeons reward you with Forbidden Keys upon clearing them. You also get the fourth and final key through beating the final boss of the game. The four Forbidden Keys can then be used to open up the door to the ultimate dungeon, optional, yes, but very worthwhile. It's full of the hardest enemies, most ingenious puzzles, and greatest dangers, all concluding with a seriously challenging boss.

To see everything within Ittle Dew 2 took me about ten hours of playtime. This includes getting all ten trophies (again, I played the PS4 version), maxing out Ittle's health by finding all of the Crayon Boxes, upgrading all possible equipment to max, beating all eight regular dungeons and the four optional ones, and reaching the end of the game. I can very much see myself replaying Ittle Dew 2, despite having done everything even trophy-wise because it was such a rewarding experience, especially as a big-time Zelda fan.

Ittle Dew 2 isn't without its faults, however. The frame-rate did struggle in more action-intense areas, particularly some boss battles, which cost me precious health when trying to avoid their attacks. The bosses themselves are recycled throughout the main dungeons, only differing in what attacks they add each time. So be prepared to see the same three bosses in the initial seven dungeons multiple times. Even though the developers lampshade this with dialogue even making fun of things like "development costs" as to why the same bosses are being battled, which is very funny, but at the same time, it's still not optimal. In addition to these issues, there is the small one of doorways in dungeons and indoor areas being a bit too easy to be hit back into. It sucks when you're trying to take down an enemy that takes a fair amount of time to beat and it knocks you back into a door, causing you to leave the room. When you return, the enemy obviously has its health back.

Then there's the biggest problem: The price point. Generally I equate massive games with a $20 price point, which something like Ittle Dew 2 really isn't. When you can get a game like Dead Rising on PS4 or Xbox One, which is a much larger game for the same price, it can be hard to recommend Ittle Dew 2 at its current price. However, if you really dig quality Zelda-like experiences, I believe you won't feel TOO much sticker shock with the price.

Hmm. Don't I recognize you from somewhere? Why, yes, that OTHER dungeon. My mistake!

Despite these issue minor and a little more major, Ittle Dew 2 is a satisfying adventure. Finding hidden areas and dungeons, not knowing what hazards, puzzles, and treasures await, makes for a very fulfilling quest. Solving particularly challenging puzzles after taking minutes to comprehend what exactly it is the designers had in mind for you to do is especially gratifying and feels great. Ittle Dew 2 is a worthy adventure that uses its inspiration from Nintendo's Legend of Zelda series wonderfully, packing in its own brand of self-referential humor to make it a delightful game from start to finish, and for repeated plays.

[SPC Says: B+]

Review code provided by Ludosity.

Ittle Dew (Wii U eShop) Review

It's Hump Day, everybody! Start your Wednesday morning off the right way with a brand-new SuperPhillip Central review! ...Okay, there's better ways to kick off a work day morning, but go with us here! Here's our review of Ittle Dew, a Nintendo eShop title from Ludosity for the Wii U. (Note: Screens are not all entirely from the Wii U version of the game.)

Do the Dew

While the third-party support on the Wii U is without question anemic, besides Nintendo providing content itself, indie developers have picked up the slack. In a certain sense, it's somewhat of a blessing that the larger third-party studios have decided to stay away from the Wii U. Indie developers and their games don't get as easily overlooked or upstaged due to the fact that there's little else on the system besides what Nintendo and competing indies have to offer. I know for certain that I probably wouldn't have been able to take a look at so many indie games on the Wii U had my time and money went towards larger, more expensive third-party efforts. That isn't to say I don't miss third-party support or the absence of it is great for the Wii U or the indies developing for it.

Still, I love highlighting indie developers when I can, and when one of the studios churns out a game, I'm happy to cover it-- more so if it's of actual quality. Ludosity's Ittle Dew, a Zelda-like game that released on other platforms in digital form last year, is one of those games. Take a gander at what Ittle Dew does right, and you'll see that you'll want to do the dew, too.

One thing you'll notice right away when playing Ittle Dew is its great similarities to The Legend of Zelda games A Link to the Past gameplay-wise, and The Wind Waker, art style-wise. Ittle Dew constantly plays out like an amusing parody of the series that doesn't take itself seriously in the slightest. From making morbid jokes about eating the hearts of enemies to regain health to why the island exists in the first place, Ittle Dew puts a lampshade on many Zelda conventions, but it does so in all good fun.

I think we can all be thankful that isn't the case!

Ittle Dew has you returning to the island's main castle on multiple occasions. It's pretty much the game's Temple of the Ocean King a la The Legend of Zelda: Phantom Hourglass. However, unlike said temple, progress through the castle is made easy with various portals that can be traveled through to make reaching past destinations inside the huge area a breeze.

The purpose of trekking through the castle is to obtain gold from treasure chests. Once enough gold has been acquired through venturing within the areas available to you with your current set of items, you can return to the island's shopkeeper to purchase a new item. Well, that's not entirely true. You see, simply purchasing the item you need wouldn't be much of an adventure! Instead, you get transported to the dungeon where the desired item is located. Not only do you have to find your way to the chest containing the item, but you have to get out of the dungeon using the newly attained doodad.

"Is that swordfish fair game to purchase?"

There are three main items within Ittle Dew, and they each take up a face button on the Wii U GamePad. The portal wand takes up two spaces: one to summon a green block, and one to shoot a wave of magic that will teleport whatever or whomever it touches to the location of the summoned green block. The latter two items include the fire sword, which is great for lighting up torches, and the ice wand, great for freezing foes. The combination of items allows you to reach further inside the island's castle, eventually letting you face off against the game's final boss.

Thank goodness there's no
overhead fire sprinklers in this castle!

The majority of puzzles in Ittle Dew revolve around manipulating blocks, defeating all of the enemies in a room, and using the trio of items in the game either separately or in combination with one another. Such a puzzle can have you summoning a green block with the portal wand, freezing the block with the ice wand so when you push the block it slides across the ground (notably over the otherwise impassable spikes) until it hits something solid, and then you using the ice wand on a wall so when you fire the portal wand's magical beam at it, it reflects off the frozen part of the wall, hits you, and you transport to where the frozen block rests. This effectively allows you past the spikes that were halting your progress. No worries-- it's a much easier process to see than it is to write out!

Ooh, baby, baby.
Baby, baby. (Push it!)

Ittle Dew seems like a short game for those who simply plow through it. However, there's a wide amount of collectible cards which feature information about various enemies in the game, as well as bits of scrap paper that when four are collected, an extra heart is added to your total health. The latter sort of sounds familiar, does it not? The inclusion of various optional caverns and puzzles make for a game that can be played long after the credits have rolled.

For those who have waited for the Wii U version or simply had no other alternative, there's really nothing special that distinguishes this Wii U iteration of Ittle Dew over already released versions. For one, the GamePad's sole use is as a map for players. Now, that's helpful and all, but it's not like Ittle Dew is an open world game where the player needs to constantly look at a map to see where he or she is going. Secondly, off-TV play is supported, but in a baffling omission, there's no sound from the GamePad when this option is selected. Hopefully this can be patched in in the future, and it won' take long like a certain game called Giana Sisters: Twisted Dreams, which, by the way, we've still yet to see a patch for for the same problem here in North America!

There's far more to this castle
than meets the eye!

The visuals of Ittle Dew are really lovely and beautifully done. Characters and objects have lines that sort of wiggle and vibrate as if they were in a Dr. Katz cartoon, but it's an endearing artistic touch. The game runs relatively well, but the constant auto-saving and loading in between rooms or areas makes for some noticeable slowdown. Regarding Ittle Dew's sound, the music is passable, but I wouldn't be able to hum you anything from the game. That's just how forgettable it is, albeit thankfully not grating.

Ittle Dew is an inexpensive ($10 USD) take on The Legend of Zelda formula that isn't afraid of poking of itself and series conventions. What might at first seem to be a short and rote take on the series's gameplay is actually something worth playing due to some clever, usually brain-scratchingly good puzzles, humorous writing, and large list of collectible goodness. For a game that is essentially a Zelda-lite from an indie developer, Ittle Dew is not a title you will have to settle with by simply saying, "Eh, it'll do."

...I'll excuse myself now, as even I felt how forced that wordplay was.

[SPC Says: 8.0/10]