As I don’t mobile game, occasionally I miss a game that I’m interested in only for it appear on console or PC years later. Hole.io is one such game that caused me FOMO on mobile. It was billed as reverse katamari and its a perfect descriptor of what the game offers. Whilst its mobile roots hold the console version back, its still a very playable and enjoyable arcade action game with a competitive streak for local multiplayer fun too.
Each game of Hole.io has you playing as a black hole in the floor trying to swallow up as much of the level scenery as possible. Swallowing something scores points and the player or character with most points when the time runs out wins. In single player mode you go up against 7 AI players but there is a 2-4 local multiplayer mode too where competition is key. Its one of the unique benefits hole.io has over the Katarmari Damacy series – its built for competition. Its this that makes Hole.io worth buying and coming back to time after time.
At the start of each level your hole is small so you can only eat trees, lampposts, people and small objects. As you eat more, your size increases and so you can start eating more things like cars or small buildings. The bigger the object, the more points you earn so its a real race to the top. Critically there is only so much on each of the 6 levels in the base game (3 more DLC levels are available offering the best (Space) and worst (Farm) levels in the game) so you’ll be fighting for real estate. Part of the fun is that you can eat other players so if you are bigger than your opponents, you can chase them and eat them for points. If you are eaten, there’s a time delay before respawning. Controls work intuitively and easily, with a few limited power ups to trigger if you collect them for making you grow, move faster or to shrink objects around you. The AI are quite easy to beat in single player so having friends is really what gives the game longevity.
Alongside the main eat everything objective, there are lots of character customisations, power up upgrades and collectable cards to unlock. These cost coins and you can eat those up during each match. The most efficient way to earn coins is to satisfy the bonus objective you get given every time you play such as eat 12 astronauts, eat 40 trees or eat 20 skyscrapers. These earn 600 coins and make the very long grind to upgrading power ups a lot less grindy. There is also a separate endless mode where you can eat things up on a blank plain. This is a mild distraction from the main mode but doesn’t have the legs to keep you coming back aside from getting the associated trophies or achievements.
Hole.io is superb as a quickfire multiplayer party game. It has the same fun and quirky vibe as the Katamari series and the versus mode shines brilliantly. Whilst its mobile roots mean that levels can be small and the lack of tactics to vary the gameplay up start to numb the fun over extended periods of play, if you keep games short and snappy, Hole.io will stay in your local multiplayer rotation for some time to come. Enjoyable and I’m delighted to finally own it.
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