Big Hops is the sort of that it’s easy to get excited about, and it is because it feels like it plays fair. Yes, there will be challenging leaps and levels with secrets that seem just out of reach. But it is very possible to accomplish everything, and the easy to learn controls make it simple to get accustomed to the movements you’ll need to fly over gaps, scale walls, and get through even the trickiest environments.
Big Hops stars a young frog named Hop. As the game begins, he’s exploring a forest and camping with his sister, Lily. Except he has a weird dream before everything all begins with an unknown voice claiming that they know Hop longs for adventure. It’s then that a spirit named Diss kidnaps him, asking him to collect Dark Drips. In order to actually get back where he belongs, Hops will need to visit different worlds, each of which involves a different type of biome with people to meet and challenges to deal with, in order to build an airship and get back.
If you’re familiar with classic platformers like Super Mario 64 and Donkey Kong 64 or more recent games like Yooka Laylee, you’ll feel right at home with Big Hops. While there are NPCs to interact with and challenges to overcome, at its core the game is about landing incredibly jumps or acrobatic feats to collect all kinds of things. Airship parts? Sure. But also bugs, veggies, gadget blueprints, music mixtapes, Dark Bits for trinkets, cosmetics, and the gameplay and story-advancing Dark Drops and airship parts. To accomplish this, you can jump, climb, dive, double jump, swing with Hop’s tongue, wall run, and engage in other parkour actions to reach pretty much every spot you can see.
The design direction makes each of the locations we visit feels very different, and the veggies also feel like we get a little more control when it comes to how we get through these spots. Because of those types of produce, it can feel like we determine how to overcome certain puzzles or reach certain spots. I do feel like some of the locations were more entertaining than others. Like I enjoyed Open Ocean and Red Desert, but I didn’t enjoy Shattered Mountain. But because of the veggies that let us do things like immediately get access to fire via peppers, create a tightrope with a cactus, or create bounce pads with mushrooms. The right answer for getting through spots can seem a bit obvious sometimes, as the oil shots end up being really helpful in many situations and the balloons are more specific, but there is freedom to experiment and try things.
And the Trinkets system feels like it adds even more freedom. It adjusts gameplay elements and restrictions or grants abilities. As examples, Deep Breaths+ increases the breath meter, Grip Training+ reduces stamina used when climbing, and Stacked+ allows three of the same type of item in one slot. There are a lot that are great and feel like they could be general quality of life adjustments or help a player with areas where they maybe feel week. I felt like I could make the most of the exploration elements, and I did adjust them in certain areas.
If anything, the only thing that kept me from really adoring Big Hops is that there isn’t all that much to the story. Not that a solid platformer needs an epic novel with earth-shattering developments, but I never really felt like there was anything super notable happening. Hop is cute and all. Some NPCs we meet in worlds can be charming. But it struck me as very anticlimactic, especially the ending.
Big Hops is a really pleasant platformer that gives players many ways to approach its challenges. It’s versatile, and the controls feel pitch perfect. The nature of it also means we get to see some pretty varied biomes. Some worlds do feel more interesting than others, sadly, and and the story could be stronger. Still, it’s quite enjoyable and worth someone’s time if they enjoyed titles like Yooka Laylee and Super Mario 64.
Big Hops is available for the Switch and PC.
Big Hops
Big Hops is a really pleasant platformer that gives players many ways to approach its challenges. PC version reviewed.