The Smurfs - Mission Vileaf

Review

The forest where the Smurfs’ village is located has been contaminated with the latest creation from the sorcerer, Gargamel. It’s a plant that is not only toxic but can attract and imprison these little blue people. I must say that I was really excited to play this game, as I grew up reading and watching all their adventures in my youth. I guess the nostalgia got the best of me, and I am glad it did! I had a fabulous time reconnecting with my little soul trapped in an adult body! Are you ready? Let’s get smurfing with The Smurfs – Mission Vileaf!  

The Smurfs – Mission Vileaf is a 3D platformer/adventure game developed by OSome Studio and published by Microids on the 27^th of October 2021 on the Steam platform. The game is also available on PlayStation 4, Xbox One, Nintendo Switch, PC/Mac. In addition, the game will be compatible with PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X|S.

The game consists of 5 chapters which are poetically presented in the form of a book, with a beautiful, elegant voiceover provided by the poet Smurf. In each of these chapters, you’ll be playing twice with Hefty (first and last chapters), and once each with Brainy, Chef and the Smurfette. In terms of the level of difficulty, you have Easy, Normal and Hard.  

To fight the contamination, Smurf Handy has constructed an amazing device called the Smurfizer. However, for the Smurfizer to work, you need a special flower which you get at the end of a fun and thorough tutorial. You’ll also be able to add a few upgrades to the Smurfizer by visiting Smurf Handy at the town square. However, each upgrade will require a certain number of acorns as well as a certain number of specific items such as presents, roots, bottles or mushrooms. You’ll receive acorns each time you heal a patch of grass. The other items are usually hidden somewhere within all the areas you’ll be visiting.

The Smurfizer will receive free upgrades as you progress through the game. At first, you’ll only be able to squirt/heal the flower mixtures onto the contaminated patches of grass. But soon after, you’ll be able to use the Smurfizer to fly into the air or to run super-fast; beware, you’ll only be able to do so in short bursts at a time.

The levels are beautiful and well-designed, and in some of them you have a few obstacles along the way. One obstacle is the contaminated grass; if you have not healed it, it will slow your little blue friend down. It is fine most of the time, but it might become a bit trickier if you are in the middle of a battle with critters. I really like the enemies in this game as they are cute and fun, but still quite challenging. With the critters, you have to spray them with the Smurfizer for a while; it usually takes at least 2 sprays (in the normal level of difficulty) for them to vanish into the air. As you progress into the game and gain a few free extra updates, you’ll also be able to suck these little creatures into the Smurfizer and throw them back at other enemies.  There are also enemies that sit at the top of small trunks, and these ones are pretty annoying to defeat as you have to knock down several trunk portions to defeat them while they shoot projectiles at your poor little Smurf. There are a few others, but I’ll let you discover them. Bear in mind that in some of the fights you’ll be confined to a small area, and these battles are usually tough and so much fun.

I enjoyed the story from start to finish! Not only will you be rescuing Smurfs, but you’ll also visit Gargamel’s hovel in the last chapter.

I liked the variety of the levels. Some are your typical 3D platformer/exploring levels, while a couple also had a bit of a speed platformer element, which was an added bonus for me.

As this game is really immersive, I was a little bit worried about the camera setup, especially in the exploring/platformer levels. And to my pleasant surprise, I found it very easy to scan all around my little Smurfs without any issue.  

The graphics are splendid, as is the voice-over, and the game runs well. You can play with the mouse and keyboard, but I definitely recommend playing the game with a controller. You can play the game solo or with a friend on the same monitor (split-screen) or Co-op via the Steam remote play facility.

Review written by THE CPT FROGGY for Zeepond.com

The Smurfs - Mission Vileaf Steam Store Page