I can think of no better way to start a review of Critter Crunch than to describe the beauty that transpires within: you play as an overweight woodland creature that stalks innocent bugs who are peacefully hanging from vines. Using the monster’s inexplicably lengthy tongue, you can grapple these furry varmints and suck them towards you, temporarily storing them in your capacious mouth. You can then spit these critters back up towards the vines, where they will either reclaim their resting spot or be eaten by the bigger creature that sat above them. As you can see, Critter Crunch is all about the circle of life, but is this animal kingdom adventure any fun?
Honestly, how could any of that not be fun? You play as a bulbous blob named Biggs: a chubby, hairy bugger that is so impossibly huggable that I was reduced to the mindset of a Kindergartener every time he did something adorable. The gameplay of Critter Crunch is based around sliding Biggs from side to side at the bottom of the screen as a group of happy-go-lucky insects shimmy down the vines above. Biggs’ job is to snag two of the smaller animals with his tongue and spit them back up into the mouth of a bigger bug, which makes that poor fellow explode into a piece of food for Biggs to feast upon. You must try and fill Biggs’ stomach (represented by an on-screen meter) before any of the overhead bugs get low enough to attack him, a task that gets more difficult as new bug types begin to pop up.
The variety of creatures gets vaster as you progress through the game, moving from flies to bugs to fatter bugs to bomb bugs—which detonate several rows of the playing field when popped—to blockers—which can only be felled by popping the bugs above them. To make things a bit simpler, sticking multiple creatures of the same size and color together on the vines will link them all up. Detonating one of these connected critters causes a chain-pop that automatically blows all of them into smithereens, a strategy that will save your furry butt often. As an added bonus, clearing eight bugs with a single pop will make Biggs’ baby boy wander on screen looking for a feeding. By pressing the circle button, you can make Biggs vomit rainbows into his son’s mouth for a huge point bonus, which is both the most awesomely hilarious and disgustingly horrific sight that I've ever witnessed.
The Adventure mode of Critter Crunch offers a series of interconnected stages spread all over Biggs’ island, with some nicely animated (but ultimately vapid) story sequences linking them all together. Aside from the standard “fill Biggs’ stomach” game type, the campaign includes two clever variations on the formula that keep things interesting: Puzzle levels give you a certain pattern of bugs and asks you to clear the screen in a set number of moves. Challenge levels, on the other hand, give you very specific stipulations—like protecting of one of the bug types—and a strict time limit. While a few additional level types would have been appreciated, the developers were wise enough to spice things up by dropping unique bugs, power-ups and gameplay modifiers into nearly every new location that you open up. Some of these—like a watermelon weapon that lets you pop bugs with seeds and a wildbug that will pop anything around it without prejudice—will force you to completely rethink your strategy, freshening up the gameplay often enough to keep the Adventure mode from getting tedious.
Another thing that never gets tedious is the stunning anime-quality artwork that will make you look down upon nearly everything else on PSN. You can actually see the fear in the vine-dwelling bug’s faces as your tongue barrels towards them and the joy in Biggs’ eyes as he feasts on the delicious morsels of goodness that fall his way, as the game features some of the finest film-quality 2D visuals ever seen.
In the end, while Critter Crunch might not be the most unique puzzler available on PSN, the game's charming characters, stunning animation, and variety-packed gameplay makes it well worth the paltry asking price. Just don’t ask Biggs for food…you won’t like what he gives you.
