Turbo Pudding
Pitterplop is a gentle platformer about Gilby, a small orange axolotl, and a meadow that woke up grumpy. One grey morning a cloud of grumbles rolled over the Whispering Meadow, and everyone it touched turned cross and crabby. Gilby never fights anybody. He calms things down with bounces, puddle water and the odd lullaby.
While we built the first world, we kept tucking small jokes into its corners. None of them are needed to finish a level. All of them made us laugh at least once. Here are six of our favorites.
Gilby takes naps
Put the controls down and just watch. After five seconds Gilby gives you a happy little smile. A couple of seconds later he starts looking around the meadow, as if he heard something in the grass. At fifteen seconds he yawns. At seventeen he curls up and falls asleep right where he stands.
Move, and he is off again as if nothing happened. We left this in every level, including the ones where something grumpy is stomping about nearby.
Sunflowers that sulk
Level six, Sunflower Swing, is a field where every flower has a face and every face turns to the sun. Every face but one: a little grey cloud that wants the whole sky to itself.
When that grumble cloud drifts over, the sunflowers droop their heads and sulk. Hop on one while it is sulking, wait, and ride it back up when the sun returns. The heads also tip towards whoever stands on them, so standing still is never a plan. Keep moving, or you slide off.
Nana Moss has manners
In level four, Sprouting Steps, the field has not seen rain all summer and its seeds are fast asleep in the dry ground. This is where Gilby learns to fill his cheeks with puddle water and spit it on a seed to make it grow.
Nana Moss the turtle explains the whole technique in one line: “Puddle water in your cheeks? Spit it out. Politely.” Gilby, with his cheeks full, answers the only way he can: “Mm-hm!”
The star on the tower
Every level hides keepsakes, and the meadow likes to put them where you would not think to look. In the very first level, Dewdrop Meadow, one sits on top of a mossy stone tower. A springy mushroom grows nearby, and that is not a coincidence. Bounce on it, hold jump and fly.
The other keepsakes are not always that friendly. One of the hints in the meadow says only this: “Some walls are not what they seem…” We will leave it there.
A boss who never shouts
At the end of the first world lives Burdock the badger, with a grumble stuck on her head. She greets Gilby with “WHO stomps on my roof?! Off my lawn!” Gilby, being an axolotl, replies: “Hi! You have a grumble on your head. Hold still!”
The meeting comes in three rounds. First she pops out of the ground, and cracks in the earth warn you where. Then she stands tall and lobs clods of earth. In the last round the grumble grows so big that she sneezes, and a good splash of puddle water washes it off. Our favorite line in the whole world is hers: “I never shout. Not even at moles.”
Somebody sniffled
Find fourteen of the eighteen keepsakes in the first world, and a hidden level opens off the trail. It is called Puddle Party. Somebody high above sniffles, a warm summer rain spills over the meadow, and every puddle turns into a trampoline.
The rain lasts about a minute. There are 147 dewdrops to catch, and nothing can go wrong, so it is pure bouncing. At the very end someone has left a short letter. We are not saying who wrote it or what it says. Go and read it yourself.
The first two levels of Pitterplop are free to play in your browser at pitterplop.com. There is a Cozy mode that makes everything gentler still, and a dragonfly shows the way whenever Gilby gets lost. More about the game is on its Pitterplop page.
