Donut Dodo is a game which is available on the Atari VCS, Nintendo Switch and PC on Steam. I tested it on the Atari VCS as it is perfect on the Atari VCS. If I didn’t know that it was a modern game I would assume that it really was a game back from the early 1980s that somehow I hadn’t heard of. And that is exactly how they describe this game on the information for the game.
The game is from Pixel Games SARL-S and is heavily influenced by Donkey Kong and Donkey Kong Jr. In the game you play as Billy Burns who is a red headed, bearded chef and you go across five stages over and over again to try to rack up your best high score.
The stages see you jumping, climbing up and down ladders and ropes and shimmying across wires trying to collect a bunch of donuts that are scattered across the stage. Once you have picked them all up you can then pick up a giant donut which is guarded by the main villain of the game, the Donut Dodo!
Of course there are obstacles to you getting all the donuts and with a nod to Pac-Man the three main enemies are Sniffy, Stinky and Winky. Sniffy is a mouse, Stinky is a toilet which is too big for you to jump over and Winky is literally a yellow Pac-Man ghost. To be honest I’m not sure how they got away with such an obvious clone of the ghost.
When you first start playing I think the game is actually a tad too hard. If this was an arcade game back in the day next to Donkey Kong I think some would be put off with it’s difficulty just to get used to the controls. Stinky will chase you about the stages so you don’t have time to figure much out before you have to run.
Once you’ve had a little go and realised what you can and can’t jump over, the main thing to get used to is that when you press to climb something the climb goes on autopilot and races you up or down the ladders so only climb when it’s clear to do so.
The variety of the five stages are good in the same way that Donkey Kong has distinct levels don’t all feel the exact same challenge over and over.
It’s a simple game which is very fitting for the Atari VCS which has mostly indie games in addition to the several Atari collections. This looks like an old game, but somehow feels modern and even the animation and character design feels a bit more in a modern style with fluid and bouncy animation.
It’s nice that they added a combo system to the scoring so that if you collect the donuts in a certain order you’ll soon score loads more and get extra lives which in this surprisingly challenging game is definitely welcome. Basically whichever donut is flashing will give more points and continue the combo, so once you’re into the gameplay you should try to get the high score.
Conclusion
This is definitely a game for those who like to rack up high scores and for others is still a good game just to dip into here or there for short bursts. It’s a lot of fun. It’s short, but has a bunch of replay value for a game at a cheap price.
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