PONG QUEST / DEVELOPER: CHEQUERED INK LTD / PUBLISHER: ATARI / PLATFORM: PC, SWITCH (REVIEWED) / RELEASE DATE: OUT NOW
Made by Atari, the success of the original Pong all the way back in the early 1970s is pretty much responsible for gaming’s move from the arcades into people’s homes. Its incredibly primitive gameplay – it’s basically table tennis with two rectangles as bats (or “paddles”) bouncing a square ball between them – might have been out of this world 40 years ago, but in 2020? Well, you wouldn’t think it would be up to much, would you? Wrong!
In Pong Quest, you take the role of a fully-customisable paddle (hairstyles, hats, T-shirts, the lot) who is helping King Pong to discover why his subjects are behaving to strangely. Ponging your way through the castle’s four randomly-generated (and increasingly large) dungeons, you’ll eventually gather the four orbs necessary to open The Spooky Door where all questions will be answered… Bright blocky pixel art and chirpy music fit the mood perfectly, and the child-friendly text contains plenty of jokes for the grown-ups too, so it’s very much something you can play with the kids.
But how fun can simulated table tennis be in the modern era? Running around these dungeons, you’ll often run into enemy paddles which initiates a Pong battle. The classic rules apply – use your paddle to hit the ball back and forth, attempting to score a “goal” by getting the ball past the opposing player. The difference now is that each paddle has a health bar which drops by one point every time a ball is hit. Scoring a goal wipes several points off the losing player’s total, and battles continue until one paddle is totally defeated. And there are now almost 60 different special balls to use, which add all manner of power ups ranging from simply speeding up your shot or making it extra bouncy to filling the screen with meteors or even a full-on Centipede game! There’s a bit of light levelling up to do, too, which slowly increases your stats throughout the game, and even mini-games which – in quite a shocker – are all really quite fun diversions!
Taking something as antiquated as Pong and turning it into an enjoyable modern experience is certainly something to be commended. It isn’t quite as challenging as you might like – most battles are over within a minute or so – but the gigantic dungeons in the final world are likely to take a few attempts to get through. As far as Pong goes – and this is what we’re basing the overall score on – this is hands down the best version to play in 2020. Stupidly addictive with the potential for “hidden gem” and “cult classic” written all over it, Pong Quest is definitely our “pleasant surprise of the year” so far!
