Full of hand-drawn, vibrant cartoon graphics, Puppergeist is a rhythm game that asks players to help a witch find her dead dog, Pup, in the afterlife to rescue it. It’s an unusual setup, and Puppergeist has a narrative with visual novel panels to read and reflect on. Claire the Witch might want her Pup back… but is that the right thing to do when it’s already passed over?
Whilst the story lightly grapples with grief, bargaining, and being a responsible pet owner, you’ll be spending most of your time playing the rhythm action games as you meet other dogs in the afterlife. There are four main dogs in the story, and they’ll come with a selection of games to tackle. Taking a leaf from Rhythm Heaven, the games here are either call-and-response music games or keep-the-beat games. The first set plays a rhythm in one bar of music, asking the player to repeat it. The latter asks players to press on every beat, every other beat, or every 4th beat in a bar of music. The beautiful graphics change the scenario, and Claire, her demon friend Lunne, and her dogs all look fantastic in the gameplay.
As Puppergeist doesn’t have visual UI to help players, you’ll need to keep rhythm internally or tap it out manually, and that is really the only challenge to the game itself. Each of the stages comes with a tutorial to help onboard players, and if you get it wrong, the game will repeat the tutorial until you’ve got the gist of things. There is an audio calibration tool to help you sync up your keyboard or controller, too. The games range from matching barks with pats and belly rubs, through to having a tug-of-war with a wolf dog. The settings vary, but the minigames rarely challenge the player. Only one stage, regarding spiders and mice in a cupboard, took me a few bars in the song to get up to speed. That’s because the spiders appear in trios, with players expected to follow on the beat on a 4,5,6. There are two games like this, but as this was fast-paced, I only scored a good boy rating. Getting a top rating makes you Top Dog! Awrooo!
I finished Puppergeist in exactly an hour. I didn’t lose a stage, and I scored top marks in almost every stage first time. It’s definitely on the easy side, not just in challenge but also in leniency for a pass mark. Music game veterans will barely raise a pulse, but it’s the overall experience of a heartfelt story, beautiful graphics, and varied gameplay that makes Puppergeist more than the sum of its parts. Sadly, the actual in-stage soundtrack is lacking, so I wouldn’t recommend a soundtrack purchase, as nothing was catchy or memorable. Instead, I just wanted all the puppers safe, sound, and loved. If you want a short, sweet, relaxed music game, Puppergeist is appropriately priced for an evening of fun.
Higher Plain Games is part of the Higher Plain Network. If you like what I do, please consider supporting me via Patreon for as little as $1/£1 a month. There are additional perks for supporting me, such as behind-the-scenes content and downloads. You can also share the website or use the affiliate buy now links on reviews. Buying credit from CD Keys using my affiliate link means I get a couple of pence per sale. All your support will enable me to produce better content, more often. Thank you.
