KarjaSoft is feeling the love in a big way in the week leading up to Valentine’s Day, as the indie dev has offered up the recently released adventure game Wildhollow for $5. That’s a whopping 75% off the standard price tag, a discount usually reserved for furniture stores going out-of-business!

The title can be purchased via the game’s official site through the weekend with the sale ending February 15. I put my fingerprints all over this game and can say that at $5 down from $20, it’s a damn steal.  Oh hey, and look! My review is quoted in the press release. Well it made my day anyway:

Sweden, February 9, 2010 – Indie pet raising adventure game Wildhollow available for only $4.99 until February 15.

Wildhollow is a light-hearted adventure game filled with humor, and tells the story of a young boy/girl tasked with finding his/her missing parents while also returning the titular Wildhollow ranch to full glory. The game features a mix of dialogue brimming with tongue-in-cheek humor, and pet raising elements in which the player breeds and tends animals. Available for Windows and Mac.

Originally priced at $19.99, Wildhollow is now available for $4.99 as a time limited Valentine’s offer. See the homepage for details:

http://www.wildhollow.com

Review Quotes

“Are you an adventurer who just can’t seem to adventure? Are you a villager whose name is Villager? If so, you’ll find the perfect home in Wildhollow, a well-crafted RPG/adventure/simulation game from KarjaSoft.”

- Jay is Games, 4.3/5

“The environments are refreshing and perfectly suit the point-and-click mechanics that must be embedded into them.”

- DIYGamer

“Wildhollow is an interesting animal care and breeding game. It’s a Viva Pinata/Monster Rancher style game where the primary focus is on raising and breeding unique animals, with occasional quests, achievements and items to search for when caretaking gets stale.”

- Gamertell, 80/100

“No situation is so serious that a little tongue-in-cheek humor won’t hearten your spirits, and your missing parents are no exception. Everyone’s a character, yourself included, as you joke around with all you meet, from cowardly adventurers to lovelorn kings to annoying guards and merchants.”

- Casual Explosion, 7.1/10

“It’s hard to find fault with such a professional offering.”

- Bytten, 82%

About KarjaSoft

Founded by Miro Karjalainen in 2006, KarjaSoft has previously released the fluffy arcade game Sheeplings in 2007 followed by superhero puzzle/RPG Spandex Force in 2008. KarjaSoft focuses on developing casual indie games with a twist, including lots of humor and genre blending. Visit KarjaSoft online at http://www.karjasoft.com

I had a chance to play KarjaSoft’s point-and-click adventure and pet raising title Wildhollow, and was greeted with more than a few surprises. For one, I had very little experience in the ‘pet raising’ genre and was more than a little hesitant to dive right in, but I quickly found that I could rest on my adventure/item collecting laurels to get me through the early stages.

When you get right down to it, Wildhollow is a fairly textbook point-and-click item exchange adventure game, which compliments the game’s writing and story quite well. You choose to be either a boy or a girl who’s been off studying whatever it is you may fancy; when you return home you find that your farm has been destroyed and your parents have vanished. It’s up to you to seek out clues to find out what happened to them while simultaneously restoring Wildhollow to its former glory.

Gameplay

The first part of the game will be quite familiar to most adventure gamers, gathering information and picking up seemingly random items for some later purpose. The quests are generally simple but almost always involve some figuring out or referencing of a past NPC to gain knowledge from his/her formally innocuous specialty.

Once the breeding actually came into play I was more prepared than I originally thought, and it became clear how much easier the game was made by maintaining and selling animals as your main source of fundraising. You can purchase, raise and breed a variety of animals, with cross-breeding fully encouraged to make new and different species.

Unfortunately, it takes a bit of work to get to the point in the game where you can start breeding and selling, which wouldn’t be a big deal except that the only other real way of making money is playing through the mini-games which are simple and cute at first and pretty boring after that, with the real issue stemming from the developer’s choice to make players have to go through them again and again to progress through the earlier stages of the game.

Again, once breeding begins the mini-games are a thing of the past and you spend the rest of the game trying to figure out what happened to your parents while at the same time keeping your animals both healthy and breeding.

Style

Conversations are held as stills of the characters over the city or area you are currently located, with the anime-style present throughout the character models. The environments are refreshing and perfectly suit the point-and-click mechanics that must be embedded into them.

Story

While the story of missing parents may be a little cookie cutter, the quests you embark on to achieve your ultimate goal are anything but. In fact, arguably the most enjoyable part of the game is that everyone seems to be in on it. The writing is incredibly tongue-in-cheek, specifically during any conversations that promote any kind of gaming cliche. Anytime the gameplay got a bit repetitive I could rely on an enjoyable, if not completely hilarious exchange with one of the many bizarre NPC’s in the game to keep my interest.

Everything Else

I was impressed with the length of the game (Anywhere between 5-10 hours depending on your total completion needs) and found a good balance between the relaxing nature of the point-and-click style with the occasional frantic response needed to maintain the pet raising component. I’d certainly recommend it to anyone looking for a nice take at the adventure genre with fresh writing behind it.

[The developer/publisher gave DIYgamer.com a copy of this game for review purposes.]

Independent developer KarjaSoft has announced the release of its tongue-in-cheek adventure/pet-raising game Wildhollow. The title has you assuming  young boy or girl returning home to find his or her parents missing under an unexplained set of circumstances. The player is tasked with solving quests and ultimately discovering the fate of their missing parents, while also restoring the Wildhollow ranch.

The game features an original mix of dialogue driven adventure gameplay and pet simulation elements in which animals can be raised and crossbred. A wide variety of breeds can be discovered, and varied food gathering minigames add to the results.

Both the game along with a playable demo are available now for PC and Mac through the developer’s website.

November 27 is an important day for quite a number of people. Firstly, it is Black Friday, where countless individuals will swarm stores offering discounts. Secondly, it’s my birthday. Sure, that’s not relative, but it’s important to me dammit (and the other 3 people that shared my birthday in my Psychology classes). Thirdly and most relatively, it’s an important day for independent developer Miro Karjalainen (undoubtedly one of the coolest names I’ve read, sounds like he plays guitar in a death metal band) who, under the name KarjaSoft, will be releasing his third title–Wildhollow.

KarjaSoft previously released the “fluffy” arcade game Sheeplings and last year’s puzzle/RPG Spandex Force. With a track record for humorous concepts and games, Karjalainen’s new fantasy adventure title–which promises that same humor and cleverness–will be available on November 27th. Gameplay will feature a mix of colorful dialogue and pet simulation elements, considering you will be cross-breeding and taking care of animals. Filled with quests, mini-games, and a busload of sarcastic fantasy cliches. Be on the lookout for a trial version on the PC and Mac (the platforms for which the game will be released) for download on the same day as its release date.

Read on for an AWESOME trailer.