Stacking DLC - The Lost Hobo King

Written by Craig Will, puffkix Wednesday, 13 April 2011 05:00

The PSN/XBLA downloadable game Stacking has received the DLC treatment in the form of a new adventure titled "The Lost Hobo King." Breaking down the numbers, there are three new challenges with 12 total solutions, 10 new Hi-Jinks and a slew of new dolls including 14 that are unique. At five dollars does this add-on offer enough bang for the buck?

Once again taking on the role of the smallest nesting doll, Charlie Blackmore, the player embarks on a journey to help Levi the Hobo and Hobos everywhere restore the Hobo kingdom by reforging the Lost Hobo King's Crown. You know, standard stuff.

The challenges rarely hit the brain-bending difficulty that some of the earlier ones did in the main game, though a couple can get frustrating if you don't know/remember that the X (or A) button needs to be hit repeatedly to lower hooks or raise gates… Despite the relative ease of the challenges they are still fun and presented with the same flavor of humor that dominated Stacking.

As simple as some of the solutions to the challenges are, Hi-Jinks really offer a chance to get the gears turning in the old noggin. With only the name of the Hi-Jink to go off of some seem fairly obvious. But they don't end up working out as expected and may require some trial and error, notably "Pan Fried Combo", though it doesn't take too long to eventually stumble upon the answer as the game world is fairly small and the options get exhausted quickly.

The unique dolls are definitely the real bonus (outside of the expanded story) to this offering. Running the gamut from a raccoon to a stinky-cheese purveyor, each collectable doll offers something new and fun to the gameplay. Quite possibly the coolest doll is the one called "Deep Sea Hans", a small diving suit (think Bioshock Big Daddy type suit) doll with fish hooks all over. His special ability is spinning around so that the hooks fly out like saw blades and rip apart other dolls, basically offering a hack-n-slash feel to Stacking.

So is "The Lost Hobo King" worth the price of admission? There isn't a really solid answer.Iif you really liked, dare I say loved, Stacking then this chapter comes highly recommended. I mean five dollars can't even get you into a movie these days! If you only marginally enjoyed Stacking then this could be a nice addition for you though you'd be better off waiting for some sort of special on it. You could then just use PSN/XBLA point cards a thoughtful relative buys you or waiti for it to drop in point value on Goozex. If you didn't like Stacking then this is definitely not for you and I don't even know why you'd be contemplating it. So stop it. All others be warned it only took about an hour and a half to 100% complete... though it was a good time.