The Beggar’s Run launched as a mobile game last year and was ported to the Wii U’ eShop this week. It’s an epic story about the faith of the world and a mysterious mask that grants its owner the power to see the world as a true god. Needless to say, it’s a mask made for god or godlike beings but it falls in the hands of an overweight beggar. Well, never judge a book by its cover right? Adventure awaits!
The power of the gods
A first The Beggar’s Ride looks like your ordinary platformer but everything changes the moment you find your first mask. When the Beggar wears the mask, the world will transform into a golden world filled with mysterious runes all over the place, that’s the way gods see our world apparently. The first mask gives you control over the clouds and the rain. By dragging two clouds together on your touchpad, you’ll make it rain. This is used in clever puzzles to advance in the big world.
The world is connected as in the Metroid games or like Ori and the Blind Forest. Certain parts of the world can’t be visited right from the start but will be available the moment you found the right mask. There’s a total of four masks in the game, each with a different power. The second mask enables you to play with gravity itself and tilt certain objects from left to right. The third one lets you create certain paths by placing pieces of ground where possible. The fourth and last mask enables you to control the sun and moon, changing daytime to nighttime and using the power of the sun as a weapon.
The moment you activate the power of the mask, the Beggar needs to stand still to influence the environment around him. It’s a great way to solve puzzles since it gives you the time to think about what you’re going to do. Most puzzles aren’t that hard to solve but some demand extra thinking time, it’s great to see the game never pushes you to find the solution on time. But keep in mind that you’re not alone in the world however. There are enemies running around in the world that can easily take you down, standing still is only smart if there’s no enemy near you of course!
Hard platform sections
Besides messing around with the elements, The Beggar’s Ride is also a platform game that can best be compared to a harder version of LostWinds. Although most platform sections don’t ask a lot of precision, there are some sections in the game that can be rather hard to complete due to that precision. It’s never on a Super Meat Boy level but this Beggar’s Ride sure has its frustrating hard sections. If you’re looking for an easy platformer this isn’t the one you need. Thanks to the great atmosphere and how everything is designed however, you won’t mind restarting a specific part of the game. Also note that the game is filled with checkpoints, so if you fail, you never need to restart that much. It’s fair most of the time but as said before, there are some sections that felt a little unfair due to the imprecise controls.
Collect them all
The last important gameplay element worth mentioning is the amount of collectibles you have in each level. Of course, this won’t appeal to everybody but for those who like to collect and look for every small detail in a level, there’s reason to celebrate. The collectibles in this game are golden coins, which can be collected right from the start. If you want to collect them all, you’ll need to travel back to some environments you’ve already visited. Thanks to new mask powers, you’ll be able to reach coins that were out of your reach before. It’s great that the developers added this insane amount of collectibles since the game itself won’t take you that long to beat. You can easily finish it under five hours but it’s definitely worth it. The final boss/puzzle has some kick-ass cinematic all over it, making you wish there were more of those in the actual game as well.
| The Good: | The Bad: |
| + The power of the masks | – A little too short |
| + Great visuals | – Hard platform sections |
| + Strong puzzles |
All in all, it’s safe to say that The Beggar’s Ride is a welcome addition in the Wii U’ eShop. Thanks to the four different masks, you’ll play a different kind of platform game filled with smart puzzles. The platform sections are ok, but feel unfair from time to time due to the controls of the character. Aside from that, everything about the game feels right, from the great visual style to the way it plays. If you’re looking for a fun and yet challenging puzzle game where you’ll need to jump from platform to platform, this one is definitely worth getting.
4 out of 5:
