I’ve been out of the XBLIG Thursday game for too long so it’s time for me to jump back in with Ishisoft’s chest questing puzzle platformer Treasure Treasure: Fortress Forage Extra Edition. Admittedly the name is a bit discombobulating, but behind the confusing title is actually a very cool little game.

Treasure Treasure is a 2-player wired Game Boy game in spirit, with the unmistakable faded green and yellow sprites and backgrounds to boot. Though it doesn’t really matter whether the game is made for a portable device, PC or consoles, it’s just really fun.

The game has you and a friend (or just you) controlling a cooperative pair of adventurers in search of treasure chests littered all over levels. Of course, they’re never easy to get to. You’ll have to rely on both characters and their unique abilities (the boy can move objects while the girl can jump much higher) to find a way around obstacles or more often through them with the use of the ever important bombs placed across the map. In single player you swap the control of the character back and forth instead of running around at the same time as you do in co-op.

The treasure you get from the chests seem totally random, one time I scored what appeared to be a flute, another time a piece of food and yet another time I found an unidentifiable trinket. It would appear what you get doesn’t matter, just that you get it. On the level I was playing there were over 20 chests to be had, and it took me more than a bit just to get a handful of them. Every chest I opened I felt I really earned.

Spending just under a half-hour playing the game I have no problem recommending it as one of the better $1 titles on the Indie Games channel, if not one of the better games period on the Xbox Live service. If nothing else it servers as a great vessel of nostalgia to the original Game Boy era.

[Buy/Try, Treasure Treasure:FFEE]

You can also download a prototype version of the game for free on PC.

[This is not a review. This is a "first impressions" piece based on less than an hour of gameplay.]

Screenshots