If you know who I am, then you know I love platformers with fun advanced movesets and cool art styles. An example being Pizza Tower. The very same year Pizza Tower came out, another amazing game came out of nowhere from a developer who had apparently been in the business for over 2 decades. Because it’s releasing on Switch later this April, I decided to install it on my Steam Deck and play it now. It’s Corn Kidz 64!
You play as Seve, a mutant goat who keeps having the same dream every night. Your companion Alexis is trying to get you out of this dream any way she can, but first, you have to save the palindrome-themed town of Wolloh’s Hollow…
The controls are weighty, yet fast. BogoSoft, the developer, promises, “climbing and headbutting as only a goat-type fellow could bring us,” and they deliver! You can dash, ground-pound and even do a move that’s like a reverse ground-pound, launching you into the air. You can also wall-jump. The smooth movement options and realistic weight (maybe too realistic, as the game has fall damage) bring to mind a lost sequel to Super Mario 64, an alternate reality where there was a Mario game in between 64 and Sunshine.
One of the other selling points of the game is its ”squash and stretch cartoon animation”. Seve bounces like a cartoon character as you press the buttons and his expressions are exaggerated to almost Rocko’s Modern Life levels, while keeping a style that feels like the Invader Zim video-game adaptation we never got. Plus, well-written story, clever wordplay AND a Homestar Runner reference! (During the tutorial, you WILL see the phrase “a splode”.)
One of the unique parts of Corn Kidz 64 is an XP system, something that doesn’t show up often in platformers of any kind. By collecting pink cubes around the map, you can level Seve up and access new areas.
The only downside is the fall damage and the fact that this is a “pilot episode” with only 3 levels, “roughly 1/3 the size of the classics” according to BogoSoft.
If this is the “pilot episode”, then who knows what the full thing will be like?
Amazing!
9.5/10
Written by Finley. F
