Hohokum
By Christy Matte,
Common Sense Media Reviewer
Common Sense Media Reviewers
Beautifully odd puzzle journey requires patience, tenacity.
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Hohokum
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Based on 1 parent review
Endlessly entertaining for early childhood
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What’s It About?
HOHOKUM casts you as Long Mover, a snake-like creature (developers call it "kite-like") that soars through the environment, interacting with objects along the way. The game's loose objective is to free one of these creatures from more than a dozen strange and mesmerizing worlds by solving puzzles along the way. But these aren't your average puzzles, and there's no assistance to guide you on what to do. Instead, you float around picking up characters and interacting with objects and the background. Levels can take players everywhere from serving punch to guests atop a fantasy wedding cake to rescuing a jellyfish princess under the sea, and while you may not figure out the main objective of a level right away, the world of Hohokum is designed as one to get lost in.
Is It Any Good?
This puzzler is visually stunning and beautifully scored, but will definitely need patience to complete. Zipping around with Long Mover in Hohokum, whose body parts change color based on the direction they're headed, is like a meditative journey ... until you try to solve the puzzles. Some of them are obvious and quick, whereas others might leave you searching a gray (or green or polka-dotted) landscape forever for a clue as to what to do next until your goal becomes clear or you become too frustrated to continue. Online walk-throughs of the levels are bound to be a necessity for the game, but there's something to be said for the moment you figure out a stage on your own, and the final level cut scene announces the details of the creature you've freed. The worlds are lovely and accentuated by a gorgeous soundtrack. You may find yourself lighting street lamp creatures or bouncing between objects that look like orange hamburgers. It will be strange, mysterious, and exasperating. For example, look for the 170 or so (usually) disembodied eyes that you'll need to open along the way. Weird.
If there's one primary failing to Hohokum, it's the navigation between the worlds. You can travel from world to world through portals, or you can head to the main menu and hunt down a portal from there. Either way, you don't really know where you're going until you're pretty much already there. It's frustrating when you're trying to find new levels or those you need to replay. Hohokum is delightful, infuriating, peaceful, and challenging. For kids with lots of patience, it's a worthwhile journey.
Talk to Your Kids About ...
Families can talk about the characters in Hohokum. How are they like real-life people and animals? What purpose do they serve in the game?
Can you make up stories for each of the levels? What might actually be happening?
Game Details
- Platforms: PlayStation 4, PlayStation 3, PlayStation Vita, Windows
- Pricing structure: Paid ($9.99)
- Available online?: Available online
- Publisher: Sony Computer Entertainment
- Release date: July 28, 2022
- Genre: Puzzle
- Topics: Magic and Fantasy, Adventures
- ESRB rating: E10+ for Crude Humor, Fantasy Violence
- Last updated: July 29, 2022
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