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The Plucky Squire is a celebration of storybooks, those thick-covered, weathered slabs that are the focus of dimly-lit late-night clandestine reads. It’s an ode to how fully a headlong child can fall into their illustrations and the comfort they bring. It achieves this by refashioning tropes in clever ways, surfing on a blend of spirited humour and airy playfulness that courses – and generally lands – throughout. It’s a spirited, and, dare I say, plucky little game.
But, let’s start at the beginning. You’re cast as Jot, the titular Plucky Squire, an adventurer-come-author who is a bit of celebrity in the Land of Mojo, a beautifully illustrated 2D storybook fantasy land replete with castles, goblins, and a rather surly wizard aptly named Humgrump. One thing leads to another and before long the tyrannical Humgrump boots Jot out of the 2D storybook into the oversized 3D world of a child’s bedroom. Think of a child’s amassed bits and bobs, the meaningful but valueless treasures and tat that sustain hours of play. The game plays out as Jot and friends strive to establish order in both worlds. It’s a lovely little premise teased along by a Queen’s English-spouting and suitably posh British narrator.
Captured by VideoGamer
Captured by VideoGamer
Captured by VideoGamer
Captured by VideoGamer
Captured by VideoGamer
Captured by VideoGamer
It’s an interactive storybook where the pages actually turn as you cycle through scenes. You can almost smell the ink as you roll and jump between illustrations. Jot has a trusty sword that you spruce up with purchasable upgrades and fresh moves to make the simplistic combat quite a lot of fun. But, the true highlight is how The Plucky Squire manages to merge the 2D and 3D worlds into a rich mechanically playground. They intertwine and interact without ever feeling fiddly or at odds with each other. Little portals allow you to hop out of the storybook to leaf back to previous pages. A puzzle might be solved by hopping between the two worlds to ferry back an item from a previous page. You may need to tilt the page to slide a block into the right position. A nighttime scene shifts to daytime by plucking the appropriate word from a previous page, allowing you to shift an obstacle. The very words on the page are in play.
The Plucky Squire is also quite funny, not in a cackling uncontrollably sort of way, it’s more of the acknowledging smirk variety. There’s a Shakespearean nod in a fish couple named Floatio and Gilliett. You’ll spot an NPC with a pixelated head called Banx doodling on a wall in a quaint town. On another page, flipping over a painting to solve a puzzle reveals a mooning man carved into the canvas. Some of it is very silly, some of it rather clever, quickly brushing off traditional storybook customs to create a moreish lightness that works.
Throughout my playthrough, The Plucky Squire kept nudging at something, reminding me of a game that only really came into focus in one of the nutty final chapters. It’s Undertale and it’s propensity for surprise, for unforeseen twists, and disrupting expectations. Almost every page turn comes with something you don’t quite expect. It manages to elicit that almost compulsive need to see what the next page holds that’s found in the best storybooks. That could be one of the myriad inventive mini-games. In one you’re battling an elf for a bow inside an actual collectible card game card, turn-based rules and all. In another, it’s a Aero Fighter-style side shooter pulled straight from an 80s arcade cabinet. Then a Tetris-like and a side-scrolling platformer with a rampaging T-Rex. On and on.
But it’s also the puzzles, the constantly morphing perspective, the music, the variety of settings, and so much more. One boss fight is a rhythm game; another a third-person boxing scrap. There’s even stealth, including what I can only describe as a Bomberman-rhythm game mash-up that’s genuinely wonderful. There’s so much bundled into what is on the surface a rather inoffensive, low-budget indie. It’s so much more than that though. It’s outrageously creative.
Whether inadvertently or not, this abundant creativity taps into something more meaningful: how we (maybe not so much us adults) carry the inked delights of storybooks with us beyond the last page. They are the fuel of daydreams, make believe, and, for some, the intangible spark that leads to inventing brand new tales. It’s the formless stuff that transforms all those bits and bobs strewn across a child’s bedroom into props, stages, heroes, and contraptions – a uniquely private world of innocent play.
Though I thoroughly enjoyed my time with The Plucky Squire, it wasn’t all smooth sailing. About 8 hours in and nearing the story’s conclusion, I hit a bug. It was a game breaking one that anchored Jot in place. Reloading the save and restarting didn’t help, nor did using the game’s useful save history feature. The only solution was to slog through the game again from scratch with a new save. Hopefully All Possible Futures will cook up a patch in time for release, but just something to keep in mind.
Review on PC. Code provided by the publisher.
About the Author
The Plucky Squire
- Platform(s): Nintendo Switch, PC, PlayStation 5, Xbox Series S, Xbox Series X
- Genre(s): Action Adventure, Fighting
