Buggle Stars

Developer: The Casual Collective
Publisher: The Casual Collective
Release Date: Undetermined
System: PC
ESRB Rating: N/A
Official Web site

In a nutshell: A cute little game with a big processor requirement.

0:00 I heard about this casual freebie from Joystiq's always excellent Free Game Club, which described it as "a platformer with an adorable shell to hide its difficulty." You had me at "platformer," but "adorable" and "difficulty" didn't hurt.

0:01 "Welcome! Use the left and right arrow keys on your keyboard to move your Buggle and collect the stars." I do, and my little grey puffy guy clambers along some stark white angled floors. Already I'm loving the gentle guitar music.

0:02 The up key jumps. My little Buggle makes an adorable little squeak when he lands. AWWW!

0:03 Stage 2 has a floor made of purple springboards, while Stage 3 introduces a slightly higher super jump.

0:04 Stage 4 has buttons that remake the terrain, while Stage 5 urges me to move quickly to collect the stars that are appearing around the stages. Thus ends the short-ish tutorial.

0:06 On to a simple map screen with a bunch of buttons to activate the various levels. Only the first one is available for now, so up and let's go.

Read the full review at Crispy Gamer