Welcome to Penko Park! Home to the cute, the creepy and everything in between. Although the park has long been abandoned it’s still teeming with life so grab your Penko Snap-A-Lot 9000™ and getting to snapping those Penko!
Penko Park was developed by Ghostbutter, a Berlin-based studio and the self-proclaimed home for weird, spooky and cute games, and was published by Secret Mode. After an exclusive Steam release in 2020, Penko Park now graces the Nintendo eShop and is a delight to say the least.
Penko Park is home to the Penko – this world’s native monster species, and they come in all sorts of colours, shapes and sizes. From the get-go you’ll witness the range that these cuties have – there are flying Penko, fishy Penko, mosquito-sized Penko and Penko the size of mountains! After meeting your aptly-named tourguide Penki the Penko, you’ll journey through the park, gradually discovering more and more about the park’s crazy creatures, humorous history and spirited secrets.
The game is an on-rails shooter, akin to Pokémon Snap, where you’ll traverse one of a handful of park areas, documenting the park’s inhabitants via camera. At the end of a run you’ll select your best photos for a scrapbook, which’ll net you points for unlocks, which will in turn open up new abilities and areas for snapping different Penko around town. It’s a simple gameplay loop but it works – and if you’re a fan of Pokémon Snap you’ll be at home here! (Plus, cos it was first released two years prior on Steam, this beat New Pokémon Snap to the next-gen snap game!)
And I have to mention my favourite part – the names. If you thought Pokémon had some outlandish names you ain’t seen nothing yet. While some Penko species have classically gibberish mon names like Grogro or Wooblurn, others have names that’d suit some random bloke at the pub. I cracked up after snapping 10 nonsensical-named Penko when one popped up that was just named Jim. And its especially funny after seeing 25 years of standard Poké-esque naming mechanics.
Penko Park is short but sweet. While it’s not a long game – beatable in about three hours, double that for 100% completion – it’s a game brimming with character and atmosphere. If you want to check out a cute, indie take on the Pokémon Snap formula you can not go wrong with a visit to Penko Park!
Rating: 4.5/5
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