Blaze's Indie Heroes range of Evercade carts features titles that have previously been made available as part of the Game of the Month campaign, which sees a new title downloaded to the console each month, entirely free of change.
The catch is that when the new title arrives, the only one is removed from your console. However, Blaze then bundles all of the games up and releases them on a physical cart; we've already had two of these packs, and this third entry pulls together 13 indie-made releases in one convenient package.
Without the hook of nostalgia, these games are totally reliant on their quality – although, it should be noted that they're designed to imitate the look and feel of vintage games, despite the fact that they've all been developed quite recently.
Highlights include action platformer Thunder Paw, puzzle and RPG hybrid Bone Marrow and Bubble Seahorse Adventures, which does a good job of channelling the same visual vibe as Super Mario World on the SNES.
However, the highlight of the entire pack is Pixel Games' Donut Dodo, a colourful homage to single-screen platformers like Data East's iconic Burger Time.
You need to collect all of the doughnuts on each stage whilst avoiding enemies (including the titular dodo), with your only skill being your jumping ability. With its bright visuals and infectious music, Donut Dodo is brilliantly addictive and incredibly challenging, and is almost worth buying this cart for on its own.
The downside here is that the load times for Donut Dodo are quite long, and it's possible to purchase it on Steam and the Switch eShop for a low price already. Of course, the fact that it comes with 12 other indie games on this Evercade cart means you're getting better value for money here – even if the lack of recognizable games means that the usual pang of nostalgia isn't present.
Comments 8
Good review, although Donut Dodo was a GOTM game. It’s been noted, like in your review, that the game has long load times, which weren’t there when it was a GOTM game. Blaze have stated on the Discord that it’s being looked at, as others have reported it.
Bone Marrow is also a corking game, as is Big2Small, so for me, this is another good-value cart
Good way to get some coverage for your games! I've never heard of most of these
This isn't a review. It doesn't even say all the included games.
@michaelf I must have missed it! I've edited the review to reflect this. Thanks!
@michaelf I thought I didn't remember the load times being so long when donut dodo was game of the month.
The overall quality of the cart seems pretty high so while donut dodo is a highlight it's not only good game on the cart. Worth noting that bubble Seahorse adventures and donut dodo are native evercade ports.
@jbrodack agreed. Whilst I haven’t played as much of Seahorse as Dodo, I have definitely enjoyed the former.
Slowly but surely there are more native Evercade games being released!
Even though it's not even a spec on most gamers' radar, "Donut Dodo" is also available on the Atari VCS 800 via the online store.
For those reading it nowadays they fixed the load times in Dodo.
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