Image via Lululu Entertainment
Henry Halfhead is such a personable game. Playing around in a sandbox world, watching a character who is only made up of half of a head use a special ability to hop into inanimate objects to control them with a running commentary can be great. It’s charming! I just wish that it sometimes felt a little better to play. Because while it does all work, sometimes I’d happen across a tedious objective or situation that got me feeling a bit motion-sick due to the shifts in perspective.
All of Henry Halfhead is presented as an overview of Henry’s life, complete with reactive narrator changing the script based on our actions. Things begin with the character as a baby, starting to explore boundaries of a room and play around with an ability to jump into any object to move it or cause certain interactions. As our avatar finishes certain objects and they “grow,” causing areas around the initial space to expand and grant access to new locations and parts of Henry’s life. However, past places are still accessible, so we could go back to bring new items to use in old spots or perhaps complete jigsaw puzzles and more pieces are unlocked.
Lululu Entertainment’s execution is honestly really flawless and seamless. Especially when it comes to the fantastic narration. The prompts that come up as we become different objects are both funny and sometimes insightful, revealing things about the character’s preferences and life. It’s the sort of running commentary that always only adds to the experience, rather than detracts from it, and I appreciate that any other kinds of audio can sometimes be a bit more subdued so it stands out. Like if you add batteries to a radio or plug in a device to hear songs, we will get to hear some of the (also great) soundtrack. But at the same time, the narrator will sometimes comment on the music itself, which I appreciated.
There’s also such a wide range of items to become. Many of them with special interactions that come up at the push of a button. For example, becoming a toy duck or cat will cause quacking or meowing sound effects to play when you press a button. Or when I hopped into a knife during a birthday scene, I could interact with a cake to cut it. See an outlet hanging in midair near an electronic device? Plug it in to cause a light to turn on or music to play. We’re essentially set loose in a toy box where we can become every toy.
The thing about Henry Halfhead is, while I like a whole lot about it, it also frustrates me in the same way Exhausted Man could. When you can appreciate it as a freeform toy box, it is a lot of fun! There are some great interactions here. The narration is also first-rate. However, some of the challenges feel, well, exhausting. An early example involves setting a table for his birthday and preparing for the celebration. But that means going back and forth to move items from one shelf, leaping from item to item to get to it, then performing fiddly jumps between a box, chair, and table to get them in the right spot. Challenges like that can feel more tedious than entertaining sometimes, depending on the objective.
Worse is the camera execution and design of some challenges in Henry Halfhead could result in some motion sickness. A recurring situation involves stacking items in an area to reach X height, with the X variable increasing with each instance. The problem is that these situations can also include bouncy elements like pillows and chairs, and with the nature of a physics-based game like this, it’s possible to get discombobulated, have the camera go in odd ways, or see things careen beyond your control when trying to efficiently get through a task. It’s easy enough to deal with the first time, but from the second instance onward it definitely made me a bit nauseous.
Henry Halfhead is at its best when it allows us the freedom to do whatever we like, play around with object interactions, and enjoy the narrator’s responses to our decisions. I loved hearing about Henry and the constant color commentary. It’s so much fun to experiment! The only thing is that since this can have some physics game properties, some tasks might feel a bit more tedious than others or could involve some unexpected camera effects and perspectives that might involve some temporary discomfort. Still, it is generally delightful and fun to play with for two or three hours.
Henry Halfhead is available on the Switch, PS5, and PC.
Henry Halfhead
Henry Halfhead is at its best when it allows us the freedom to do whatever we like and enjoy the narrator’s responses.