Oddworld: New ‘n’ Tasty (PC) Review
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New ‘n’ Tasty is a fantastic marriage of a really well designed puzzle platformer and a deep, social story that is just as meaningful now as it was back when it was originally released. You can tell that Just Add Water have crafted this game with love and care and have created something that modernises and improves the gameplay of the original without sacrificing what made it great. The difficulty spikes will have you tearing your hair out in places, and the somewhat imprecise movement leads to some moments of frustration, but this is an excellent game that is worth of your time. If, like me, you missed this the first time around, then you owe it to yourself to buy this game and find out why it’s so highly regarded. If you played it the first time, it’s worth buying again to revisit a challenging and enjoyable game.
Abe’s Odyssey is brought back and souped up for the current generation consoles. But this is a bit more than a simple remake.
Oddworld: Abe’s Odyssey was one of those games that was highly regarded back in it’s day, and I looked at it with curiousity, but I never got around to playing it. Now, the game is back with a remake called Oddworld: New ‘n’ Tasty, and had been developed with Just Add Water. It was released for the PS4 last year, and now it’s finally arrived on PC, and I decided to give it a shot to see if I’d missed anything.
Oddworld focusses on the story of a Mudokon named Abe, who is a slave at Rupture Farms, a place where he has never left. But slavery is all he and his people have ever known. During his janitor duties, he notices the CEO of Rupture Farms looking at the state of the place, and seeing problems ahead, announces a new food product which will be made out of the Mudokon slaves which will turn around their fortunes. At this point, Abe realises that he needs to escape Rupture Farms and free his fellow slaves so they are not turned into a tasty snack products, in what is a deep story about racism, capitalism and over-consumption.
New ‘n’ Tasty is more than just a simple remake. Developer Just Add Water has built this game from the ground up, with features that cater to a more modern audience. The biggest example being the addition of more checkpoints than the original, which is a welcome addition because this game gets extremely difficult in places, sometimes frustratingly so. But they are worth persevering with to continue the story.
The game has received a visual upgrade and has a great style to it, with a colourful yet grim world, and great animation and character models. There’s a lot of dark humour to this game, and Abe is weirdly adorable, and with his skinny look and parts of his mouth sewn shut, he makes for a very sympathetic character.
The game starts off simply and does a good job of gradually unlocking more of Abe’s powers, and it gives you some idea of why the Mudokon were being kept down as slaves. While the controls mostly work well, there is the small problem of the movement being imprecise. Walking and running are controlled by applying different amounts of push to the left stick, and it’s not particularly gradual, so you can find yourself overshooting a jump or not getting far enough and getting blown up.
The sound has also been revamped, and makes a nice and fitting soundtrack to the game. Dialogue has also been recorded and new dialogue has been added to the game, which adds a bit of extra life to the game and the world. Abe himself has a slightly dopey, loveable voice that adds to how endearing the character is.
FINAL THOUGHTS
New ‘n’ Tasty is a fantastic marriage of a really well designed puzzle platformer and a deep, social story that is just as meaningful now as it was back when it was originally released. You can tell that Just Add Water have crafted this game with love and care and have created something that modernises and improves the gameplay of the original without sacrificing what made it great. The difficulty spikes will have you tearing your hair out in places, and the somewhat imprecise movement leads to some moments of frustration, but this is an excellent game that is worth of your time. If, like me, you missed this the first time around, then you owe it to yourself to buy this game and find out why it’s so highly regarded. If you played it the first time, it’s worth buying again to revisit a challenging and enjoyable game.