Dokuro: A Bone-a-fide Hero Emerges Today on PS Vita
In my last PlayStation.Blog post, I talked a bit about the origins of my favorite numbskull, Dokuro, and the story surrounding his heroic exploits. My ever-diminishing pool of skeleton-themed puns notwithstanding, I’d like to go a bit deeper into the gameplay elements of Dokuro as well as the concepts that spurred development choices. Although Dokuro was inspired by children’s books — The Velveteen Rabbit and a Japanese children’s book called Kuma to Yamaneko — don’t let the adorable chalk-laden game fool you into thinking the Dark Lord’s castle is child’s play. At first, Dokuro may look like a pretty straightforward 2D side-scrolling puzzler: You’ve got a clear goal of escorting the princess from point A to point B, and a seemingly narrow list of what you can and cannot do to accomplish it. You push a few boxes around, toggle a switch or two, and bash a few bozos who try to hurt your precious princess. The game wouldn’t be a fraction as interesting as it is, however, if it simply stopped there.
