Pikmin has never been a bestseller compared to Nintendo franchises like Super Mario. Yet, the idea of having a personal real-time strategy game with players throwing cute beings around an oversized environment has struck a chord, leading to Pikmin appearing around the Super Nintendo World theme park and receiving a Niantic mobile game. Developer Splashteam's Tinykin asks the question: what it would look like if Pikmin's Olimar were the protagonist of a 3D sandbox platformer?

Tinykin was revealed during the PC Gaming Show at E3 2021, including an animation by Andrea Asperges and Federico Bressan that invites players into the perspective of Milo: a future interstellar explorer who re-discovers Earth, devoid of human life and trapped in the 1990s. He beams down into a suburban home, finds himself only an inch tall, and seeks answers to the strange happenings as his means of teleporting out is broken.

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A press demo sent out by Splashteam and publisher tinyBuild covers an early portion of the adventure that ensues. It includes a hallway tutorial area that connects to the game's main hub in the cellar, now the Chrysal Workshop; and its first level in the living room, converted into the City of Sanctar by one of many sentient species of insects called the Shieldbugs.

splashteam tinybuild game preview february 2022

Ultimately Tinykin is a lot like the 3D platformer/collectathons that flooded the market in the 1990s and early 2000s, predicated on a conceit that Milo must visit open-ended areas and collect parts of a machine that will allow him to travel outside. To do so he'll have to appease bugs that hold claims in each territory, not unlike quests in classic titles like Banjo-Kazooie and Spyro the Dragon, as well as modern takes on this formula like Super Mario Odyssey and A Hat In Time.

As with many of those titles, Tinykin thrives on the charm of its world. Tinykin's influences include 90s sci-fi comedies like Honey I Shrunk the Kids, and its set design fleshing out environments with house-wide pillow forts made from everything lying around is second-to-none. Acclaimed titles like It Takes Two have done similar things in recent years, but where Hazelight Studios leans into fantasy worlds that emerge from this child-like imagination, Splashteam commits to designing living worlds in the bones of abandoned suburbia.

splashteam tinybuild game preview february 2022

In the game's first level, Milo is tasked to retrieve a banner from Solaria, leader of the Shieldbugs. His task is simple on its surface; the Shieldbugs are attuned to "Ardwin's Canticle," a song from the "god" once overseeing the household that no other bug can hear. This Canticle has become the center of the Shieldbugs' religion, driving them on crusades to find "holy artefacts" as dragonflies hold sermons in a grand cardboard temple. Milo and the player realize their latest artifact is a CD, and the main goal becomes fixing a CD player at the top of a media center overlooking the temple.

Milo is an agile protagonist whose movement is supplemented by a bubble-glider that hovers for a few seconds, as well as a soapboard that turns movement into a sort of Tony Hawk's game when held active. Players are subject to sloping physics as they move faster, and they can grind along the edges of almost every surface. Not only is the living room small enough to support this snappy movement and easy to memorize, but the entire area is also designed around creating shortcuts by pushing objects into place, dropping ropes from high-up areas like cat towers and the couch, and creating grind rails across huge gaps.

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splashteam tinybuild game preview february 2022

Much of this is accomplished with the help of the Tinykin. Unlike Pikmin, which players must grow and bring into each environment, Tinykin's levels have a set number of critters scattered in pods. The demo included pink Tinykin that are strong enough to lift set pieces, knock objects into place, and carry objective items like the CD Player's 'play' button; as well as red Tinykin, which explode when tossed in specific areas. There will be five types in the final game but the game will smartly swap to the correct Tinykin for a scenario based on the player's target.

Where Pikmin are generally weighty and encourage each throw to be considered, players can fire Tinykin at an object even while Milo is floating or grinding on rails. This helps to emphasize the game's open-ended freedom. While there is a main task to each level, that story is unobtrusive. As soon as Milo enters an area the player is free to go anywhere they want, and they'll find something important regardless of the destination.

splashteam tinybuild game preview february 2022

If one landmark doesn't have a main quest item or collectible, it will open new shortcuts with multiple paths to almost every area, accrue extra Tinykin (of which there are more than necessary in any given level), or uncover lines of nectar in every nook and cranny. This nectar is of the same ilk as Banjo-Kazooie's Musical Notes in that it takes a keen eye to collect every bit, but the ant brewery purveyor Sikaru doesn't require it all. Players can seek enough to finish a level and move on, but she lets them know only a finite amount exists if they're "dedicated" enough.

The story being secondary to Tinykin's gameplay (which likely will get more nuanced as Milo gets additional gear) is accentuated by the lack of enemies and similarly unobtrusive NPCs with unique designs among species that all speak Animal Crossing babble. There are characters to meet around clubs built into guitars, hotels constructed out of CD racks, and so on; and many of them are worth talking to for one-off gags. Many are named after their personalities, or are references to characters like Huey, Dewey, and Louie from Ducktales; some play into real-world critiques like that of the rivalry between Thomas Edison and Nikola Tesla. Yet they typically only matter for that gag, or to activate a side quest for collectibles, and players can immediately go back to exploring.

splashteam tinybuild game preview february 2022

Tinykin's approximately two-hour demo offered plenty other reasons to explore, notably the music design that seems simple until players realize nearly every area has a permutation of the same song. For example, a song takes on a techno twist while exploring the guts of a television, or transposed to an organ within the temple as bugs sing Ardwin's Canticle. The world is also detailed down to small things like carpet frills bristling under Milo's footsteps, steps that echo in different ways on almost every surface.

Yet it's telling that the real driving incentive to explore is the satisfying feeling of exploration as comes naturally to its controls. With the game set to release this summer, it's the kind of short, casual romp that 3D platformer fans should be interested to get their hands on.

Tinykin is scheduled to release in summer 2022 for PC, PlayStation, Switch, and Xbox. Game Rant was provided an Alpha demo build for this preview.

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