A Boy and His Blob

A Boy and His Blob is a loose reworking of an old game from the 8-bit era into a form that shares the main idea with the original while otherwise standing entirely on its own. A boy meets a white, gelatinous creature from another planet, and together they set out to save its home from a ruler who has overtaken it. The pair's strength lies in a simple rule: the boy carries a bag of jellybeans, and every flavor of jellybean turns the blob into something different.

An orange one produces a trampoline, a coconut one a coconut shell that serves as a battering ram, others create a ladder, an umbrella, a hole in the ground, or a bubble that lifts the boy upward. The player thus doesn't collect weapons but tools, and every level is really a puzzle about picking the right transformation at the right moment in the right place. There's hardly any combat, enemies are mostly avoided, and the boy is fragile, so a mistake means an instant return to the checkpoint. Besides the main path, every level hides treasure chests that unlock harder bonus levels built purely on logic.

What catches the eye most, though, is the look. The hand-drawn animation recalls a classic cartoon and, even at the time of release, was noticeably above what was typical for smaller Wii titles. One small detail matters greatly: whenever the player presses the right button, the boy hugs the blob, a simple thing that gives the whole game something like a heart. The music is subdued, orchestral, and calm, so the whole thing feels more like a fairy tale than a platformer. Reviews were very praising, but sales lagged, and the game gradually became a cult favorite that later got ported to newer platforms. Today it's one of the best smaller titles ever released on Wii. Controls do without motion elements, and the game runs smoothly, so nothing technical spoils the impression. It works best in small doses over several evenings, since the puzzles rely on careful thought rather than speed, and that's exactly what sets it apart from most platformers of its time.