Adventure Time Review: Hey Ice King! Why'd You Steal Our Garbage?!!

Welcome to the first post in a series where I intend to play through every Adventure Time video game! This is something I've wanted to do for a hot minute now, basically ever since I finished the series and found out that they made a series of licences console and handheld games. I won't be counting mobile games, partially due to how many there are, and how difficult they can be to run these days. There are five titles that I'll be covering in this series, talking about multiple platforms where applicable, and just generally reviewing these games to see if they're licensed shovelware slop, or rare hidden gem. I'll be going through these games in release order, so we're starting off with "Adventure Time: Hey Ice King! Why'd You Steal Our Garbage?!!"

"Hey Ice King!" released in 2012 for the Nintendo DS and 3DS, developed by WayForward Technologies and published by D3 Publisher. This was the first game I saw when I looked into Adventure Time games, and honestly it was a treat!

First off, let's talk about the platform differences. Going into this, I assumed that this was likely a DS game that essentially had an enhanced version of the 3DS, basically upgrading the DS game for the 3DS audience. I was wrong. In reality, this is a game made for 3DS, that then had its audio bitcrushed and its assets compressed to fit on a DS. I could tell as soon as I started the game on my DS that that was what was happening, from the terribly bitcrushed audio to the JPEG artifacting all over the sprites. I don't blame WayForward for doing this honestly, they were trying to meet the audience of kids on the DS in 2012, which makes sense. Especially for a licensed kids game! It just means that the DS is an inferior experience artistically when compared to the 3DS version, which has full-quality assets and audio. I opted to play on the 3DS for this reason, but the DS version should function just fine if that's really what you're after.

Moving into the game itself but staying on the topic of art, it's great! All the backgrounds look like they were ripped straight out of the show, which I might think was a genuine method if not for the amazing amounts of unique backdrops and the paralax scrolling effects they use. The environments, characters, enemies, etc. all look like they were drawn by the same people who animated episodes for Cartoon Network, they did a great job of replicating the art of the show! The writing, similarly, is spot-on. It makes you feel like you're playing an episode from an earlier season of the show. And wouldn't you know it, the series creator Pendleton Ward worked as a writer and creative consultant for this game!

Gameplay-wise, this game draws heavy inspiration from The Legend of Zelda, namely Zelda II which is a unique point of reference! The overworld is a top-down map exploration, featuring shadowing figures of enemies to encounter, towns and settlements to visit, and dungeons to delve into. Areas are explored from a side-scrolling perspective, combining aspects of platforming with 2D beat-'em-up style combat (and swordplay akin to Zelda II). The combat is simplistic, but lends itself well to being used in fluid ways, and even once you unlock new abilities, you'll feel like you're really in control the whole time. The primary gameplay loop is done by completing fetch quests for characters around the world by running errends into dungeons and other areas to retrieve specific items, in exchange for new items or access to new areas. These sections might get tedious, however the engaging combat mechanics and the absolutely banger soundtrack help stave off that feeling.

The soundtrack is great, everything except the title screen is original, with that being a part-cover, part-remix of the show's title theme. The rest of the OST is original, and it's really good. I found myself nodding along to basically every song, with a few standouts that I would download this album just to listen to. They didn't have to go that hard for this game of all things, but they did and I love them for that.

My list of complaints for this game is pretty short. For one, it's pretty short, I beat it in around 4 hours. This is aided by the fact that there is a New Game+ mode afterwards, so that likely doubles the length if you want an extra challenge, but that's still only around 8 hours of gameplay. I would've loved if the Land of Ooo was bigger, more unique types of enemies, more option side content, etc. That actually leads me into point two, which is that I feel there wasn't much side content. The loop of finding some random out-of-the-way thing and later discovering it was relevant the whole time, never gets old. However, aside from a few chests here and there, I never felt like there was anywhere to find bonus optional content, everything was pretty streamlined. That certainly works for some games, but in a Zelda-like adventure, I prefer to have side quests and optional content to maybe get unique equipment, extra upgrades, etc. Third and final point, I wish the bosses had more going on. Maybe they do in New Game+ mode, I didn't get far in that yet, but at least in the main game all the bosses have, like, two attacks and run them on a single repeating cycle. Finn and Jake have a lot of cool combat moves that you can utilize, but it felt like most of the big fights were won by standing in the corner for a second, stepping to the right spot to spam attacks, then stepping back again. Bosses with a little more complexity would make the combat feel worthwhile and realized in a more full way. Also maybe some more uses for Finn's sliding kick attack.

Honesty, I think "Hey Ice King!" is something of a 3DS hidden gem. It's a really fun Zelda II-like adventure that plays on that style well, while also doing justice to the source material for its license. I had a ton of fun with this game, not only as an Adventure Time fan, but also just an enjoyer of games. It was cute and fun, not too hard but not too simple, I really enjoyed it! If this sounds like the kind of game you'd enjoy, definitely give it a try on DS or 3DS, you won't regret it! Even if you find it to be bland or barren, at the very least its a charming interation of a Zelda-like formula, and for that it deserves its Adventure Time-themed props.

~ Alex Amelia Pine

This post is a part of the series Game Reviews