REVIEW: The Little Acre


Title	The Little Acre
Developer	Pewter Studio
Publisher	Curve Digital
Release Date	December 13th, 2016
Genre	Point-and-Click Adventure
Platform	PC, iOS, XBox1, PS4
Age Rating	E10+
Official Website

The Little Acre may be the single most charming game that I have played thus far. The amount of care and love that went into this game is astonishing. In this day and age it’s very difficult to find people who really love what they do, and this game shows what heart and determination can do.

Set in Ireland sometime in the 1950’s, you play as Aidan and his daughter, Lilly, as you slowly begin to unravel the mysteries of your father/grandfather’s strange disappearance. You visit the mysterious realm of Clonfira and try to unravel what your father/grandfather was doing. The story feels like one you’d see in an old animated movie, and the ending made me genuinely surprised and satisfied.

The first thing you’ll notice before anything, even before you start the game, is the art style. The game looks like you’re playing a Saturday morning cartoon. Everything in the game is animated by hand, and if you’ve ever been on the other side of animating, you’ll know just how astonishing of a feat that is. It looks absolutely stunning, and is very well detailed in every aspect. A lot of love went into designing every environment and character. There are even small details that flesh out the game more, such as animals in the foreground and things constantly happening around the screen.

The stunning art is only helped by the great soundtrack. From the calm and serene Celtic Inspired music, to the cute and whimsical cartoon music, to the strange music when you enter the world of Clonfira, all of the music is great and fits the levels that they appear in perfectly. It isn’t the most robust soundtrack I’ve ever heard, but considering the type of game it doesn’t really need to be. The voice acting only helps to better immerse you in the world. The voices fit the setting perfectly and just have this air of old cartoon charm to them.

The characters are maybe the best part of this whole game. You’re only introduced to five, but most of them are really fleshed out and all of them were likeable. Lily, the little girl, is just like any other child. All she wants to do is adventure and have fun. Aidan is the lovable and caring father, whose curiosity sometimes manages to get in the way. The only other one who was really fleshed out is the family dog, Dougal. He’s brave and courageous, but also a kind caring dog. All three of them really care about each other and will jump in to save each other at the slightest sign of danger. The other two, Arthur and Nina, aren’t really fleshed out that much. We know that Arthur was Aidan’s father and Lily’s father, and that he was a scientist turned farmer/inventor. He lived with the two and set up all of the inventions in the house. Not much is known about Nina, just that she worked with Arthur and was really close to him.

This game is wonderful, and it feels good to see so much love being put into a project, and it deserves all of the recognition it gets. The only thing holding this game back is the length. It’s perfectly understandable that the game is only a couple of hours long considering it’s hand drawn, but I feel like it really holds back the story of the game. So many more things in the game could’ve been expanded upon, especially the ending. The game is currently $12.99 on the Playstation Store and I would definitely recommend anyone who is a fan of this type of game, or even just animation in general pick this up. It’s well worth the asking price, and these developers deserve all the attention that they can get. I look forward to seeing more from them in the future.