Humongous Entertainment is known for its Point and clicks adventure games. With more titles such as; Putt-Putt Goes To The Moon, Putt-Putt Joins the Circus, Fatty Bear's Birthday Suprise, and much more.
Putt-Putt Saves The Zoo was a wonderfully developed game. Created by Humongous Entertainment and designed by Ron Glibert. This Putt-Putt game came out in 1995 and is rated E for Everyone.
Is Putt-Putt Saves The Zoo fun?
First of all, Putt-Putt Saves The Zoo is a fun game for a younger audience. A majority of the game keeps your attention through point and click interaction. I am currently a Sensei at my job called CodeNinjas. CodeNinjas teaches kids how to build games on a program called scratch. I have noticed that when they are building simple point and click games, it brings a lot of enjoyment to them. This being said, it makes sense to me why the well-known game Putt-Putt Saves The Zoo was executed so well for a younger group of people.
Some examples of what makes this game so fun to play is that there are unique multiple animations for almost every object in the environment of the game. This means that even if kids get distracted or if they forget what the objective of their current mission is, there are still events happening that keeps them engaged. Below is a sample of myself and a friend talking about why point and click was such a good choice in helping this game be fun.
I would like to argue that I personally feel that the Putt-Putt games, in general, are not going to be as fun for more experienced gamers. I have played many games and Putt-Putt Saves The Zoo has extremely simple and easy puzzles and is a bit predictable. At my experience level with games, I would say that the game is not as fun because of the simplicity of the gameplay design, and puzzles. Putt-Putt Saves The Zoo becomes more interesting because of the attention to art and animation.
The Game Learning Curve
The game was easy to understand. All of the game can be played with clicking. The reason that makes it easy is because the basic function of a computer is using the mouse and clicking. That means that even if it is someones first-time using a computer, they could easily experience and play Putt-Putt Saves The Zoo to get a taste of video games.
The other amazing addition Humungous entertainment added to the game was when Putt-Putt the character reads signs in the game. This makes the game educational for kids. Education through gaming is probably one of the most important reasons for making a game. The ability to be able to provide both entertainment and education is invaluable.
Game Graphics
The first and most important thing to point out about Putt-Putt Saves The Zoo 16 bit graphics is that the art style is timeless. Most older games graphics are easily outdated as time goes by because of the heavy restrictions on game developers regarding technology. I believe graphics that are still enjoyable to the majority of the population today are essential to stand the test of time. Putt-Putt's colors and art style looks like modern-day cartoon characters which helps us visually tie the past to the present. Cars in the game had eyes and floating eyebrows to help give them each their own personality and expression.
There is also an area on the map where you can do a small amount of character customization. I love that they added this little feature in the game.
Game Audio
The audio in Putt-Putt Saves The Zoo is incredibly catchy. Catchy music helps gamers remember your game because if they find themselves humming the tune, they may replay the game just because of the nostalgia of the music.
This Putt-Putt game also includes sound effects or a little bit of rhythm when clicking on objects or items in the area. The player could probably make their own song just by clicking around the map and chiming in different instruments.
Another important audio note to make is that Putt-Putt the main character speaks out loud when clicking on items and when trying to solve puzzles. This helps the player know what he or she should be paying attention too and reminds them of what they are searching for. This was a clever mechanic to add to a game in order to help solve puzzles.
The first time I played this game I remembered the theme song to this day. If that doesn't remain timeless, I don't know what does. Here is a sample of me dancing along to the music because of how amazing it was.
Game Controls
The controls of the game are simple and easy to understand. The whole game is played with moving the mouse and clicking. This makes it playable for anyone.
The game includes a visual cue for different interactions around the map. The mouse will go back and forth between a solid white arrow and a outlines arrow which tells the user that they can click on something, or scroll over to the next area on the game. This is helpful information to the player so that they can navigate throughout the game more clearly.
Story
The story focused on opening up a zoo. 5 animals were missing around the zoo that needed to be returned home. This story was easy to follow, but not very complex. The players objective was to solve puzzles to help get animals back to their habitat and family.
Some things did bother me about the story. There was a snake who slithered to the Arctic land and the lion character somehow got stuck on a rock in the middle of a waterfall. My main issue with this is that it is not very believable. I understand that it is a game for kids and is supposed to just be fun but maybe creating a more logical story would help more experienced gamers stick around and be interested. Stories are one of my favorite parts about games so I subjectively argue that this story was a little lackluster and dry. Below is a clip of my frustration with the story.
Characters
The Main Characters in Putt-Putt were Putt-Putt himself, Baby Jambo the elephant, Kenya the lioness, Sammy the seal, Skeeter the snake, and Masai the giraffe. I generally like the characters in the game. Each of them had a good sense of personality because of their voice actors. The voice actors did a good job representing their characters with inflection and personality in their voice. The story for each character again was not bad, but I certainly believe the audio saved the main characters.
Putt-Putt himself is a wonderfully developed character. He's a fun protagonist and remains consistent throughout this story and the other games. Character consistency is important to help make the story and game believable. Believability is one of the most important things when creating pretend worlds.
Another thing that upset me about the characters was Queen Leona and King Leo. They are the parents of Kenya the lioness. When Putt-Putt is out looking for Kenya the parents seem to be lounging around and not searching for their daughter whereas some of the other parents like Mrs. Giraffe is worried and looking out into the fields for her child Masai. This is an example of a lack of character consistency which leads to the story being unbelievable which is where my frustration as a player begun.
Game Graphics and Design
Putt-Putt generally did a strong job on the game graphics and design. A few more design elements I would like to point out is the way the game devs created minigames. Games with-in games are always a fun way to branch out from the main game and have a change of pace to keep the gamer interested.
There was a mini-game where the user counts and clicks on animals which again is a good education tool for children. There was also a mini-game referencing pong and the Coca-Cola bear. This was a fun addition, however, the controls for that mini-game were uncomfortable. The mouse for the game would be in one spot and Putt-Putt would be controlled in another spot which created confusion. The mini-game would have been a lot more successful if that had been fixed.
The animal counting minigame had visual ques to help the player understand what they were choosing. For example, The easy mode was blue, the medium mode was green, and the red was hard. When the player wants to quit the mini-game a menu comes up with a green and red smiley face. The green was shaking its head, yes and the red was shaking its head no. This gave the player multiple visual cues to help them understand what was going on. This is important for not just kids but everyone. Human beings learn differently and this menu gave a good number of ques to understand how and what the buttons do.
Below is an example of what I am talking about.
Next, I would like to talk about inventory design. The inventory was always on the main screen and did not have to be brought up by clicking another button. I also liked the way items were aesthetically placed into the "trunk" of the car. This was both a simple and smart way of including an inventory system.
Lastly, the reward the game consistently gives is happiness from other characters for being helped. This is a valuable motif to take away from the Putt-Putt games. The amazing part is that Putt-Putt Saves The Zoo is teaching facts about animals, how to read, and that helping people is a strong character trait to carry in life.
Changes
If I were to make any changes on Putt-Putt Saves the Zoo I would have changed the visual confusion I mentioned earlier in the polar bear pong-like mini-game. I would also have changed some of the character stories to make more sense. For example, maybe Keyna the lioness got stuck in a tree rather than a waterfall because cats climb trees and get stuck especially if they are still a kitten.
Visually, I might change some of the fonts, for example, Arctic and land are so close to each other that they look like one word "Arcticland". The reason this is important is that since this game is educational, we could be telling kids that it is okay to spell Arctic land like "Arcticland" .
Other than those minor details, the game was awesome for the time period and carries over into continuing to be successful today.
Recommendations
I would recommend this game to modern-day kids and even beginning coders. This game accomplishes a lot with a simple point and click mechanics and consistently provides insight into the foundations of what makes a good game. Educational and fun will always make it to the top of my list on what I think an extraordinary game is.
Even today when I brought up that I was playing Putt-Putt Save The Zoo so that I could review it, friends were super happy and told me about how much they loved the game. Some would even start humming the theme songs. That right there tells me Humungeous entertainment did a wonderful job.
and a big thank you to Elijah Mancilla for joining me on the playthrough.
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