Product Description

Love puzzle games, but also love an adventure? Now you can have both in one game with Henry Hatsworth in the Puzzling Adventure, an exclusive Nintendo DS adventure-puzzle game that adds a new element of fun by combining the action of an adventure game with the challenge of a puzzle game all in one. Meet Henry Hatsworth, a quirky, light-hearted character who will guide you on your journey through a new style of gaming adventure on your Nintendo DS. In this two-in-one adventure, explore five exotic worlds, fight a variety of opponents, and venture through more than 30 levels, including nearly a dozen hidden levels while taking on outrageous world-ending bosses. The separate worlds on the two Nintendo DS screens have a cause and effect inter-relationship, and you choose when to switch between conquering the action-platform realm and mastering the increasingly challenging puzzle world. A wide variety of power-ups will help Hatsworth in both of these worlds. Complete puzzle combinations and defeat puzzle enemies in order to gain power ups, health, and energy to supercharge Hatsworth in his adventure.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #2541 in Video Games
• Brand: Electronic Arts
• Model: 19048
• Published on: 2009-03
• Released on: 2009-03-17
• ESRB Rating: Everyone
• Platform: Nintendo DS
• Number of items: 1
• Dimensions: .64" h x 5.43" w x 5.22" l, .25 pounds

Features

• Keep an eye out for gems and treasure to purchase your favorite weapons and abilities along your way.
• Make quick switches between the intense action-adventure gameplay and an increasingly challenging puzzle world.
• Jump, fight, and shoot your way through 30+ levels, including nearly a dozen of hidden levels and take on outrageous world-ending bosses.
• Explore 5 exotic worlds in a mad hunt for artifacts, each of which grants new abilities for Hatsworth and unlocks a massively powerful golden mech suit.
• Solve challenging combo-puzzles in order to gain more health and energy and enhance your melee and ranged weapons and help transform Hatsworth into multiple powerful forms.

Amazon.com Product Description

In Henry Hatsworth in the Puzzling Adventure players embark on singleplayer fun like no other. Here Henry Hatsworth, a quirky, lighthearted character serves as your guide on a journey through a new style of gaming on your Nintendo DS that combines the action of an adventure game with the challenge of a puzzle game. In this two-in-one extravaganza players explore five exotic worlds, fight a variety of opponents, and venture through more than 30 levels, including nearly a dozen hidden levels while taking on outrageous world-ending bosses. Gameplay The separate worlds on the two Nintendo DS screens have a cause and effect interrelationship, and you choose when to switch between conquering the action-platform realm and mastering the increasingly challenging puzzle world. A wide variety of power-ups will help Hatsworth in both of these worlds. Complete puzzle combinations and defeat puzzle enemies in order to gain power ups, health, and energy to supercharge Hatsworth in his adventure. Henry Hatsworth in the Puzzling Adventure is the ultimate quirky NDS game that innovatively intertwines platform and puzzle genres in a fun, addicting, and challenging manner. Key Game Features: Two Game in One - Keep on your toes. Make quick switches between the intense action adventure gameplay and an increasingly challenging puzzle world. Non-stop Action - Jump, fight, and shoot your way through more than 30 levels, including nearly a dozen of hidden levels and take on outrageous world-ending bosses. 5 Exotic Worlds - Explore 5 exotic worlds in a mad hunt for artifacts, each of which grants new abilities for Hatsworth and ultimately unlocks a massively powerful golden mech suit. Puzzles Galore - Solve challenging combo-puzzles in order to gain more health and energy. The more puzzle combos you complete, the more you can enhance your melee and ranged weapons and transform Hatsworth into multiple powerful forms. Puzzle Power-ups - Activate puzzle powerups to help Hatsworth in the puzzle world and the action game. Collect Along the Way - Keep an eye out for gems and treasure to purchase your favorite weapons and abilities along your way. Screenshots: 5 exotic game worlds. View larger. Puzzles galore. View larger. Non-stop action. View larger. Over the top story. View larger.

Customer Reviews

Two average games combined to make a single great game
When I got Tetris for the DS years ago, I always thought it would be really nifty if my actions in the Tetris game would manipulate a game in the top screen. Henry Hatsworth accomplishes that exact goal. The top screen of the game is a platforming game and the bottom screen is a puzzle game. Taken individually, either of these elements are honestly very average in design and polish, but when integrated together the design takes on an entirely new dimension delivering a unique gaming experience.

GAMEPLAY: As mentioned before, the top screen displays platforming action where you run, jump, collect, slash, and shoot. As you defeat enemies and collect stuff, those monsters and items become puzzle pieces in the bottom screen, which is constantly filling up. Pressing the "X" button, you can switch to puzzle mode for a limited period of time to finish off enemies and activating items by matching three or more of the colored tiles. The bottom screen plays exactly like Planet Puzzle League, Tetris Attack, or Pokemon Puzzle League. Build up enough power in puzzle mode and you get the ability to shoot energy bullets from your gun or even transform into a giant robot. If you neglect to eliminate enemies in the lower screen, they come back to haunt you and cause you trouble in the top screen. Items that are not activated in puzzle mode and neglected are lost forever. As you play you will collect treasures that can be cashed in for power-ups and upgrades which affect various abilities in the platforming and puzzle screens. The integration between the two modes is almost seamless. My biggest complaint is that collision detection for some attacks is really poor, especially the "ground slam" attack. Luckily you are rarely forced to use those abilities except when you choose to do so.

GRAPHICS: The top screen has very nice, clean, and colorful graphics. The animations are smooth and look nice. The bottom screen is clean and functional, but nothing special. One nice thing I will mention is the color choices of the puzzle pieces are fairly friendly to color-deficient (aka color-blind) gamers. I have yet to accidentally mix up my yellows and my greens, which I appreciate greatly. I would have liked to see more contrast, but oh well.

STORY: The characters in this story are annoying. The story is wacky and weird and there are a lot of little jokes and jabs towards the ridiculously rich and the British.

SOUND: Sound is a mixed bag. The in game sound effects are decent, fun, and unobtrusive. The cut-scene sound effects are terribly annoying, consisting of snooty grunts and vocalizations intended to mimic (or mock) British aristocrats. It feels forced and gets tiresome very quickly. Luckily, you can skip cut-scenes at any time with the simple press of a button.

VALUE: While I'm not sure of the *replay* value of the game, which consists of more than a couple dozen levels, I can tell it will last me a good length of time. Some levels have alternate paths that lead to bonus treasure, which is also a nice touch. The difficulty ramps up fairly quickly and the challenge of managing the top and bottom screens may be enough to cause some players to lose interest.

Overall, I expect this game to be somewhat of a sleeper hit. While this game is packaged and marketed like any other throw-away kids title, this game is anything but throw-away. Hardcore gamers, especially fans of platforming or puzzle games, should definitely check this game out. I would caution against this game for younger children because I really think the difficulty near the mid and later levels may prove too frustrating for them.

Fantastic game, platform puzzler with great controls!
If you are a fan of either (or preferably both) platform games or puzzle games then you will love Henry Hatsworth! I must disagree with the other reviewer in regards to the story / characters being annoying. I find them quite endearing with the sound affects tied to each character being quite humorous and charming. The artwork is beautiful, and the sound is great for the game.

The controls are where this game really shines in my opinion, platforming usually comes down to the simplest common factor, the jumping and general controls. Henry Hatsworth shines in both of those categories, the controls are so tight that you can really control the character with fantastic precision. The character doesn't feel floaty or bloated in any way. The mechanics of the game are fantastic as well, complete puzzles to unlock bonus items, refill your life bar, and eliminate enemies. Switch back to the platforming and continue on your way. It keeps the game fresh all the way through.

On top of that there are a ton of "power-ups" to unlock as you progress as well.

Hours of fantastic gameplay wrapped up in a lovely little package. Definitely check it out if you like the two genres mentioned!

Oh, lastly, I wouldn't call this a "kids" game in any way. It offers some real challenge to even experienced gamers such as myself, but persistence will eventually get you through the game as well if you're skills aren't quite up to snuff.

looks great, less filling
I'm a lifelong gamer who particularly enjoys puzzle and adventure games. I've played, loved, and posted reviews for many DS puzzle games. When I saw the ad for this game, I literally rushed right out and bought it. Maybe it's just a question of too-high expectations, but I really wanted to enjoy this game, and I was very disappointed by it.

Hybrid games that combine multiple genres are all the rage now, undoubtedly boosted by the popularity of Puzzle Quest. But I definitely disagree with the earlier reviewer who stated that 2 average games combine to make a good one. No, in this case, 2 below-average games combine to make an average one.

The concept is intriguing. Interweave a 2D side-scrolling platformer with a unique match-three-type puzzle game, where each game plays on its own screen and the progress in each game feeds back into the other. Sounds great! But Henry Hatsworth is no Puzzle Quest. I forced myself to give the game 5 hours to capture my heartstrings, but it never grew on me, and there are plenty of other more interesting games to play.

Henry Hatsworth uses a noteworthy system of gibberish sounds for character voices. It's not just subtitles, and it's not traditional voice acting, it's something in between. Imagine recording a voice actor making a few dozen unusual sounds. None of these recorded sounds are words, but some sound like words. Then, during your video game cutscenes, when your characters are talking, play back those sounds in random order while the subtitles appear on screen. The result is an unintelligible melange of word-like sounds. You might call this form of voice acting "innovative", or a "bold stylistic choice". You might also call it "grating" or "awful". Perhaps it's most fair to say this particular artistic choice is "polarizing"; some will find it charming, and others like me will simply turn it off.

I don't hate the game, nor do I intend to sell my copy just yet. I can see how some people like it, and if I run out of other games, I might try it again. But for folks looking for a good puzzle game on the DS, I recommend Professor Leyton, Puzzle Quest, and Picross DS, in that order, all of which are better than Henry Hatsworth.