Kwirk
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| Kwirk | |
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| Developer(s) | Atlus |
| Publisher(s) | Acclaim Entertainment |
| Platform(s) | Game Boy |
| Release date |  March 1990 |
| Genre(s) | Action/Puzzle |
| Mode(s) | Two-Player |
| Media | Cartridge |
Kwirk (also known as Puzzle Boy in Japan) is an action/puzzle video game developed by Atlus and published by Acclaim Entertainment similar to Sokoban. It was released in March 1990 for the original Game Boy. Kwirk is nicknamed the Chilled Tomato.
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[edit] Story
Kwirk and his girlfriend Tammy, a tomato herself, were both out "painting the town red" when they both decided to explore the unnamed city's subterranean labyrinth below. While down there Tammy suddenly disappears and Kwirk, with his Veggie Friends, now has to find her in the labyrinth and bring her home.
[edit] Gameplay
Kwirk is actually three separate games in one, Going Up?, Heading Out?, and Vs. Mode, each one with its own set of individual rules. The objective is to run from one end of the room to the other by rotating turnstiles, moving blocks, or filling holes with blocks.
There are three Skill Levels which accounts for the games difficulty settings, Level 1 - Easy, Level 2 - Average and Level 3 - Hard. After that you select two different viewpoints Diagonal or Bird's Eye. The difference between the two is that in Diagonal view, characters and blocks have a shadow, whereas Bird's Eye view does not. These are featured for all three game modes.
[edit] Going Up?
In Going Up?, your objective is to go from floor to floor moving and rotating blocks to make your way to the staircase on the other side. There are ten floors for each Level for a total of thirty floors. Along the way at certain levels, Kwirk will receive help from his Veggie Friends which you can control by switching between them and Kwirk. This game mode offers a menu screen that allows the following;
- Redo – You can start the entire stage from the beginning if you make an error or you can’t make any more moves.
- End – You can end the game and return to the menu screen.
- Back – You can undo the last move you made in the stage up to eight times.
Scoring is based on the amount of time it took to complete the stage and the number of steps you took to get to the stairs.
Going Up?, serves as the story where Kwirk has to rescue Tammy from the maze. Although it features no storyline to progress the game, each stage ends with Tammy displaying the score and after ten floors to each Level, Tammy and Kwirk are reunited.
[edit] Heading Out?
In Heading Out?, your objective is to complete a certain amount of rooms consecutively to get a high score. There are a total of ninety-nine rooms of which you can select the amount you want to run through. Once you start, you sprint through each room solving the puzzle. You score by earning Bonus Points upon completion of each room. The Bonus Points start at 2000 and decrease during the course of the room and resets after entering a new room. A timer is included to track your time through the course. After running through all the rooms your score is then recorded on a top four list.
[edit] Vs. Mode
Vs. Mode is a race using Heading Out? mode between two players. Each player selects a number of rooms to race through, but both player do not have to select the same number of rooms as a handicap. Then a Contest is selected to decide the win condition; 1 Game playoff, or a Best of 3, 5, 7, or 9. Once started, the players can monitor each other through a Progress meter on their respective screens. The match ends when one player completes all the rooms.
[edit] Obstacles
In each room, Kwirk has to navigate around various obstacles which are blocks in order to advance in the game.
List of Obstacles
- Brick Walls – sometimes they are lined up in the middle of the room. You can’t move them and sometimes you have to move blocks around them.
- Turnstiles – Blocks set on an axis that turn 90 degrees when moved. They come in single, double, triple, or quadruple turnstiles. They won’t turn if something is next to them.
- Blocks – Basic blocks of various sizes, some may take up half a room, in which you move around to open a way for Kwirk to move across the room.
- Holes – You can’t walk over a hole, instead you have to walk around it, but if there is a block in the room and it can fit in the hole, you may move the block to fill the gap and walk over it.
[edit] Kwirk’s Veggie Friends
At certain points in the game Going Up?, one or all of Kwirk’s Veggie Friends will appear to help. They don’t have special abilities instead they play like Kwirk and offer the player the ability to position a Veggie Friend in certain places that will allow Kwirk to move along the room past all the obstacles. The player has to move all of the Veggie Friends onto the stairs with Kwirk in order to advance past that stage,
List of Veggie Friends
- Curly Carrot
- Eddie Eggplant
- Pete the Pepper
- Sass the Squash
[edit] Reaction
Having been released in 1990 and its exposure very obscure, Kwirk is an overlooked game. Many game sites list Kwirk but have little or no review from editors or critics alike. Most of the critque scoring is at the hands very few players.
[edit] Kwirk on television
Kwirk’s only appearance on Television was in the show Video Power, as part of a cartoon short called The Power Team, which featured characters from Acclaim games. He goes berserk whenever they call him a "to-MAH-to" and not a "to-MAY-to".
[edit] References
- Kwirk and its instruction manual.
