Adventures Of Lolo Review

I don’t play a whole lot of games that are solidly puzzle games, but the Lolo series I do like to visit every once in a while. It’s a pretty solid series with a pretty solid opener. This is that opener. How’s that from drama? Not good, right? Right. Anyway… the game does have a rather unique and confusing history kind of like Adventure Island did. I’ll do my best to explain.

Adventures Of Lolo is the fifth game in the Eggerland series. It was the third game in said series to be released in Europe but it was the first one to be released in North America. See. Off to a solid start already.

The game has two direct sequels. The Adventures Of Lolo (that’s the name of the second game in Japan), The Adventures Of Lolo 2 (this is the North American one, but it has stages from earlier Eggerland games so it’s more of a compilation than a sequel I guess?), and Adventures Of Lolo 3. There’s also an Adventures Of Lolo for the Game Boy that was released in Europe and Japan, but it isn’t the same Adventures Of Lolo that we got in North America. This Adventures Of Lolo is actually the tenth game in the series.

Make sense? So to recap. Adventures Of Lolo is the fifth game in the series. It has a sequel called Adventures Of Lolo (Japan only) which is the 6th game in the series. But the sequel called Adventures Of Lolo 2 isn’t really a sequel and it’s just a lot of level from previous games bundled together. And the tenth game in the series (not in North America) is called Adventures Of Lolo.

See. Easy.

Anyway. Princess Lala(la) has been kidnapped by the evil King Egger and taken to his disco palace. Lolo(lo), that’s us, need to go push some blocks, throw some discs, and avoid horrible death in order to save her.

The gameplay involves our round blue hero (not to be confused with the Blue Lander from Compile games), collecting heart tiles in the 50 rooms of the castle. Collecting all the tiles will open a chest which contains a gem which in turns clears the level. The challenge comes in from having to avoid enemies. Some are totally lethal, some are just mobile roadblocks, some are platforms waiting to happen. Other obstacles include rocks, trees, sand, water, lava, and arrow tiles which are, essentially, one way gates.

When the level calls for it Lolo(lo) will gain abilities when he picks up heart tiles. These are either the discs mentioned above which will encase enemies in eggs. An enemy in an egg can be pushed around or hit again to make them temporarily leave the play field. Eggs will hatch over time releasing the enemy. Eggs also float and can be used as a means of crossing water in certain situations.

Other abilities include a hammer which can break a single block, a stepladder, and the ability to rotate an arrow tile. A word on the arrow tiles really quick. It’s not exactly a one way thing. If the arrow is pointing down, you can only exit said tile in that direction. You can enter the tile in one of the other 3. You can walk in from the top/right/left side, but cannot enter from the bottom. Get it? Got it? Good.

Enemies you’ll need to look out for include little snake dudes that don’t harm Lolo(lo) and instead just like to watch him work. There are two types of Medusa (Medusi?) in the game, a male and female version. Lady Medusa are stationary and will stone Lolo(lo) any time he is directly north, south, east, or west of them AND there’s a clear line of sight to him. There is no avoiding this attack. The Male Medusa (called Don Medusa) works the same way, but they are mobile. They move up/down or left/right and the same rules apply. If they spot you, you lose a man. The Medusi are active while as soon as the player takes their first step in a stage. I’ll explain what I mean below.

The other lethal enemy types include an armadillo which will follow Lolo(lo) around and try and bump into him. This is, of course, instant death. The armadillo dudes, however, cannot cross all floors. Sand really messes with them. Use that to your advantage. Rocky is another enemy that is active as soon as you start the stage. They don’t kill you and are pretty content to just wander the level. However if they sopt you (line of sight like the Medusi), they’ll charge at you and trap you. A fate worse than death some might say. The only way out is to use the Select Button to restart the level at the cost of a life. Now we’ll get to the other enemy types.

There are skulls which also bounce around and try and nibble your ankles to death. Not very pleasant. But the plus side of the skulls is that they don’t activate until you’ve picked up all the heart tiles. You can rub your face on em all you want till they wake up and they don’t even care. Finally there are some pink fire breathing lizards. They face one direction, they’ll only fire if they see you, and you can avoid this fire if you’re fast enough. They also only activate when the last heart tile has been collected.

To up your chances of survival you get the aforementioned items and you get blocks that you can push to block enemies movement, line of site, etc. The little snake dudes, when put in an egg, can also be used to block paths.

It’s good. I like it. Doesn’t give much in terms of different methods of solving puzzles, but solving them can be quite a bit of fun.

Graphically the game is really nice I think. The enemy sprites are unique and colorful. The stage graphics and design are also really nice. Lolo(lo) is fairly bland, almost a place holder kind of character like Kirby (more on that later), but as he’s the only blue thing on the screen it makes him stand out nice and neat and he’s easy to see because of it.

Musically you’re not gonna get a lot of selection here but the single track for all the stages is nice and doesn’t drive you nuts like some other tunes might. There’s a fanfare or two, there’s some game over music. But you’ll hear the stage music 99% of the time.

You may have noticed that I keep putting Lolo(lo) in like that. And I did mention Kirby. Well, Lolo(lo) and Lala(la) do make an appearance in the Kirbyverse from time to time and when they do, they’ve got that extra syllable for some reason. This is the only place that I am aware that happens.

Adventures Of Lolo is a really solid puzzle game and if you have any interest in this kind of stuff I absolutely suggest you give it a try if you like games that make you think. It’s a good time to be had by all.

TLDR, here’s some numbers.