Snail Bob 2 Review

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Snail Bob 2 is such an odd title for a video game newly released on Steam without having a previous predecessor launched in the past. What happened to Snail Bob 1? After playing only a few minutes of Snail Bob 2, I decided to do a bit of research and look into the oddball title. Apparently, there are 8 of these games, and they can all be found online – free to play – hosted on a variety of websites across the Internet. Each Snail Bob game was an episode of his misadventures, leaving it up to the player to solve his unfortunate predicament. Does Snail Bob 2 follow the same misadventures?

Is that the throne from Game of Thrones?!

Fans of this cutesy snail with a top hat won’t be disappointed with the simplicity of each episode’s story, as well as with the puzzles that are presented. Unlike the other games that concern only one adventure at a time, Snail Bob 2 features three tales – each with a problem Bob the Snail must overcome. These are Forest Story, Fantasy Story, and Island Story. I found it a little disappointing how there’s a story locked until winter of this year – practically making the package incomplete. The reassurance comes from each story having 25 levels with stars to collect – along with puzzle pieces – which is a sure-fire way of keeping the players busy. There is a total of 273 stars and 36 puzzle pieces to attain, so finding them all should be somewhat challenging to adults, but may have a longer-lasting appeal with a younger audience. Personally, I was able to 100% complete Snail Bob 2 in 5 hours but like I wrote before it may take a younger person longer to figure stuff out.

Even though I conquered Snail Bob 2 in less than a day, this doesn’t mean I didn’t enjoy the game any less. Every single level in Snail Bob 2 has a unique puzzle to solve. Doesn’t matter if an enemy is reused or an object is seen in previous chambers, I always found something to be different while encountering the new challenges. This was the peak of my interest because a majority of games to hit the market usually slip through the cracks and hit an average to mediocre play through. Snail Bob 2 surpassed that by being playful as far as puzzle solving is concerned. Before providing an example, I would like to explain how the gameplay works.

Snail Bob usually comes into a level out of a door and sluggishly moves towards left or right (depending on what side he starts on). Bob can be easily stopped by just clicking on him and leaving him to cower under his brown shell. This will allow the player to decide how to solve the puzzle without getting aggravated by the constant restarts. Bob can die as many times as the need arises, mind you. An arrow can be found at the bottom right of the screen, granting Bob the ability to flip from left to right.

WILSON!!!

Now for the example at how playful the atmosphere can be in Snail Bob. I would like to touch upon The Fantasy Story because it really opens up the different types of challenges one can expect from Snail Bob 2. The level I will be explaining also featured a petite glimpse of an altered form of Snail Bob – a bee. As silly as this reads, Bob was dreaming so it was entirely plausible for him to do it. As Bob would enter the level, I would instantly click on him to get an overview of what challenge I am to be facing. A fleeting line of red (don’t touch) clinging to the edges of the map and angry bees floating about – creating an obstacle. A pink contraption stood in Bob’s way and, I didn’t know if it would be a bad thing to jump in. Obviously it wasn’t, because seconds later I was a bee. Being a Bee Bob allowed me the freedom of clicking anywhere on the map to move while avoiding the baddies and reaching the exit in the end. Also to be noted, while analyzing each situation there are hidden stars and, sometimes, puzzle pieces spread throughout each level. These can be collected by simply clicking on them. The only other down side I saw of these levels I was most disappointed in was the amount of glitches I encountered during the last few levels. These were mainly caused by awkwardly dying without really knowing that I had kicked-the-shell. The other minor problem I seem to hit once or twice was the game freezing up.

Another awesome feature that made me nerd out a bit were the developer-added bits of pop culture references from previous movies or TV shows such as LOST, Star Wars, and even Game of Thrones. These references can be seen by simply picking them out as the levels progress. For instances, on the Island Story a computer can be seen with a number dial counting down from 108 to 0 and replaying the number sequence on the computer screen before resetting. Another example would be smaller snails wearing Darth Vader hats and even a Yoda snail showing up.

Graphically, Snail Bob 2 is a major improvement compared to the rest of the web-based series; there’s been a touching up of certain environments and bringing life to Bob himself through the addition of more character detail. This also worked well with the goblin enemies and rich rats. The cinematic cut scenes are a nice touch even though there’s no speech to be witnessed here. Snail Bob 2 is still simple enough to figure out what’s going on. The audio played its part where it needed to be heard, such as while falling toward death or playing the theme song of each episode. I do wish there was a little more variety of tunes to each level, so as to change the pace of gameplay – this is a kid’s game though.

Snail Bob 2 caught me off guard. Here we have a title that may seem like something only a child would like – which may be the case with some – but instead throws a complete curveball in the right direction. Snail Bob 2 is an enjoyable title to sit down with a sibling or son/daughter and have an interactive and enjoyable experience with. Although there were a few glitches near the end, and certain levels do not unlock, I have not a doubt in mind that Snail Bob 2 is a great family game.

This review was based on a code that was supplied to Mouse n Joypad by the Developer, Publisher or their PR Company.