Intro:
Do you know Katamari Damacy? That weird, quirky game about rolling a sticky ball around the earth, consuming everything in its wake until all life goes extinct? Well considering how it’s an old niche title from the PS2 era I doubt most of you have. Well, Donut County tries to bring the spirit of the Katamari series, with less wacky extinction-level events and more wholesome lessons on forgiveness and friendship. Also, the ball is now a hole that somehow grows every time something drops into it.
Story:
BK the Raccoon and Mira the human manage a donut shop. BK is a bit of an asshole to be perfectly honest. He does not want to take responsibility for anything and just wants to play with his Quadcopter. None of this would be too bad if his donuts were delicious treats as opposed to all consuming holes that grow every time everything is gone. Eventually, the entirety of Donut County is lost in a giant hole and Mira tries to sort things out.
The story is perfectly fine, to be honest, BK comes across as an immature raccoon child who cannot take responsibility and constantly tries to shift blame onto others (kind of like Twitter discourse). But his redemption arc and growing maturity has good pacing and is delivered with heart and catharsis. The problem is that it could have been explored a bit more. The friendship between Mira and BK deserved more depth. The world has the potential to be rather interesting but never fleshed out fully. These are not negatives but instead missed opportunities.
Gameplay:
Donut County has a problem with the game being too easy. There isn’t much of a challenge to be had when the loop entails swallowing up progressively larger objects. Any puzzles are fairly simple and quick to solve. Time a firework correctly to fire upwards to break off the edge of a cliff. Fill the hole with water to power a slide, or even fire back items swallowed up by the hole to interact with the environment. It’s all pretty basic, functional, and not worth talking about, to be honest. Donut County is perfectly fine as games go. There is so little wrong with it that I can’t comment on it much.
Move that hole
The problem with a hole as opposed to a ball is a simple one but rather persistent. Once something has fallen down the hole it is gone. It lacks the amusing quality of seeing progressively larger items and people getting stuck on the ball, screaming and pulling silly faces. There is none of the inherent absurdity of Katamari Damacy’s ball action. This would counteract the easy difficulty. Gameplay typically amounts to finding the smallest object in the level and go on from there. There is fun to be had indeed but it’s like eating a bag of crisps. It leaves little of an impression afterward.
Not much else
That is kind of it. The final boss revolves around tossing bombs back at it from the hole. Which is not challenging or a culmination of all the skills we learned (asides from tossing up things). I played Donut County within an afternoon and it served me well. But I was never challenged or had my problem-solving senses stimulated. It was a lovely distraction but that was kind of it.
Art style and Graphics:
The pastel colors and soft shapes are very appealing to the eyes. If though animation is extremely limited. The characters themselves are surprisingly expressive with the tiny gestures and adorable designs.
Performance:
Perfect
Conclusion:
Like the dessert treat that it is named after. Donut County is a fun little game that entertains well enough. But it doesn't challenge or leave much of an impression once it's over. Length prevents the game from outstaying its welcome but stops Donut County from leaving much of an impact. Play over a lazy afternoon and then forget about it.