#magic jony

005. Magic Jony

Review

After a brief hiatus we’re back with the fifth game: our first platformer. Magic Jony (the first odd spelling of many) is a cute platform game in which you play a little guy who saves the world by swallowing up monsters inside a giant tulip he carries with him.

The game starts promisingly with several intro screens detailing the story. I’ve transcribed it here:

Because nutrition sucked by the huge monsters, sor all the plants have shriving one. This atmosphere of peace has been destroyed. The green land is becoming to wasteland. And peoples lives were also threaten by monsters. Till one day, a little hero called Jony has come up, he must defeat all these monsters by his magic flower.

It might not be grammatically correct but so far it’s the best (and only) backstory to any of these games. The game itself is quite basic but challenging enough, involving climbing up and down ladders to reach cartoonish monsters and “tulip” them. The graphics are interesting but sparse, with good animation compared to some of the other games we’ve looked at up to now. Music is the usual one tune but it’s quite interesting, a complex tune played in a minor key that emphasises the fact you’re in a wasteland overrun by weird monsters.

There is one big problem however which drags the game’s score down. It seems you progress by opening chests to find keys unlocking the next area, but I was unable to open the first chest (pictured above). I tried pressing both buttons, then pushing the joystick up and down, then explored the whole area to find no other way to progress. The monsters respawn when you leave the screen so it was impossible to kill them all and perhaps move on. Sadly it means I was unable to get any further and had to leave it at that.

GSMGS Score

Graphics: 3 (Average) Quite basic but nice art on the intro screens.

Sound FX: 2 (Poor) Not much variety here.

Music: 4 (Good) Interesting and melancholy.

Gameplay: 1 (Abysmal) Bugged.

Story: 4 (Good) The only game so far with any story whatsoever.

Total Score