Mr. Driller DrillLand

Genre: Puzzle-Platformer

Players: 1-4 Competitive (Local)

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Review:

The Mr. Driller series is a long-running series of family-friendly Puzzle-Platformers where players are controlling a character in a well full of colored blocks and must use their drill to destroy blocks directly adjacent to their character to proceed, making strategic choices about which blocks to drill so they don’t cause the ceiling above them to collapse on them. Mr. Driller DrillLand is actually a remaster of a GameCube release in the series, with the original version coming out only in Japan in 2002, and with this new remaster coming to PC and Nintendo Switch in 2020.

The presentation here is extremely cutesy and juvenile, with cartoony characters and a disposable plot about a drill-themed theme park being enjoyed by a group of cartoonish drilling experts with high-pitched Japanese vocals. At the very least, the “theme park” them gives the game some excuse to use different motifs for each of its sections, and the soundtrack is decent.

For the gameplay, the game’s “theme park” motif does give the game some license to experiment with different variations on its core gameplay, making for some decent variety. In one section of the park, you may find yourself limited in how much time you can spend thinking about moves, while in another you’ll be encouraged to take your time as you’re limited in your moves, not your time. There’s even one section with an Indiana Jones-style theme where you need to purloin treasures while avoiding traps, and another with some light RPG elements where you’re exploring rooms to grab one-use spell items for use against a final “boss”.

Personally, I’ve never found the gameplay of the Mr. Driller series to be especially compelling, but I will say that this release does what it can to fully explore the series formula, and I’m sure that fans of the franchise will likely be pleased, and those who imported the GameCube game will even find a few small tweaks and improvements like new difficulty settings. I suppose if I were to point to an area that needed improvement, I’d pick the multiplayer, which could do with more options, as well as online play.

Still, for those looking for a solid Puzzle game on the Nintendo Switch, Mr. Driller DrillLand is a solid choice. The core gameplay is good, and the game does a lot to mix it up and keep things interesting. There’s certainly still room for improvement, but overall this is a great addition to the Nintendo Switch library.

tl;dr – Mr. Driller DrillLand is an HD remaster of the GameCube entry in the long-running Puzzle-Platformer series, releasing in the West for the first time. It takes the series’ solid gameplay and adds a good amount of variations to keep things interesting. I would have liked to see more done with the multiplayer, but overall this is a good entry in the series that should please fans of the genre.

Grade: B

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