"This game wouldn't be worth even looking at if it wasn't for the aesthetic. You can turn it off, sure... But why would you? Hotdog Quest: One With Everything is about 30 minutes of dumb gameplay that will make you smile."
Disclosure: I was given a copy of this game by the developer.
This in no way influences my opinion of the game.
So, as this is the first of many, I would like to explain what a "Bonus Game" is. Basically, it is a game that isn't on my set bucket list, but it's something that I either thought was interesting and wanted to play, OR it is a game that was sent to me by a developer to review and I didn't think looked like complete dogshit or shovel ware. Not every game in the Bonus section will be a review copy, but if it is, it will be clearly marked. Got it? Good. Let's move on with the review.
This game is... interesting. Not really good, but it is interesting. On it's face it looks very unique, and in a lot of ways it is. Okay, in one way it is. You might have noticed it right away like I did. The art style. I don't think I've ever really seen a game look like this in, what, 20 years? That alone is the only reason that I even decided to touch this game and I'm glad that I did. I mean LOOK AT THIS.
What the fuck am I looking at? Why can I not look away? Why do I kind of love it?
These are all questions I asked myself within seconds of booting up Hotdog Quest: One With Everything. The whole game is like this, though you can turn this stylization of the game off... You shouldn't though, outside maybe the airplane level. If you turn off the pixelized 1990's Doom engine graphics, you're left with this...
It's at this moment you realize what this game really is. A borderline shitty 2007 ROBLOX OBBY level that someone threw together over a weekend. I wouldn't even touch it, nor would really anyone else except for the desperate or YouTuber's who have been washed up for god knows how many years trying their best to remain relevant in today's ever changing landscape. But with the filter on? Yeah, I can deal with this and even enjoy it.
Normally I don't review the entire game in one of these reviews, but this game is so short that I am kind of left with no choice. There are a grand total of seven levels in this game. It takes roughly 20-30 minutes to beat the game, unless you're like me and you decide that you don't need to do all the side quests and you just want to get through the levels as quickly as possible. If you do what I did the first time around, you will realize that in each one of these levels apart from the first three levels, you get "skills" that you need to progress through the next level. These skills consisting of "Double Jump", "Dash", and "Glide". I might be missing one in there, but these are the only ones that matter.
To start off, you are greeted by a man in a hat telling you that the Hotdog Vendor has gone up the mountain, and now it is your job to go to the top and find him. You are presented with a pretty basic obstacle course where you mindlessly do parkour for about 3 minutes before reaching the top of the mountain and meet the Hotdog Vendor. He tells you that he was up there to acquire mustard for the hotdogs and to meet him back down at the bottom. Once you get back down, which he kindly presents you with a boost pad to quickly get back to the start, he tells you that he needs some tomatoes for the hot dogs and presents you with a hot air balloon to go to the next level.
It was at this point in my stream that both myself and my chat were enthralled with the story in this seemingly lazily thrown together game. When you have no expectations for a game to be good, sometimes even the little things can get your hopes up. It wasn't a good story, but it gave us hope that there might actually be something here, and I'll be dammed it at least got me to complete the whole game so that has to count for something... Right?
Oh yeah, I forgot to mention it earlier, but this game does in fact have voice acting! By that, of course, I mean that the developer used various Text-To-Speech voices at varying speeds to differentiate each character. While it sounds awful, and it is definitely bottom of the barrel, it adds to the low poly pixelated charm that is this game.
The next level is just as simple as the first. The man with that hat is back, and he informs you that "The best tomato for ketchup is on that branch high above, look around for someone to help you get up there". After doing 5 seconds of looking, you see another man behind him. He requests that you return his cow to him and he will help you get up to the tree branch. His cow is only about 50 feet away, and you have to roll it over back to him. Yes, roll. The cow is the equivalent of a balloon that is out of helium as you roll him over to the farmer like you're playing a version of Katamari Damacy that forgot what game it was. Once you "return" the cow, he gives you a boost pad that launches you up to the giant tomato, and now you move on to the next level. Simple as that.
If only a younger me, a me from 10 minutes ago, would have realized that this was the last time this game would really have anything to do with hotdogs or condiments like the hotdog vendor lead me to believe... Maybe I wouldn't have continued playing this game. That is all in the past now, though, so I must push forwards and continue my quest to acquire a Hotdog! One with everything.
Level 3 is arguably the simplest out of all of them. If you were collecting coins along the way, you can straight up just skip half of the level and not even know it. You are greeted by a man in a blue jumpsuit who thanks you for having enough money as he spawns a boost pad right under you and vaults you half way across the map before you can even figure out what is going on. Then it is as simple as climbing up a hill, talking to an alien, and driving a car to the end of the level. Yes really, that is all there is to do in this level.
Unless of course you weren't doing the only other thing there is to do in this game and you didn't collect the coins, then you need to talk to a completely different blue jumpsuit guy and collect some grapes for him. Why grapes? I don't know. What I do know is that after you gather them all up, he or she gives you a metric fuck ton of coins so you can talk to the original blue man to get the booster to the car so you can drive to the end of the level.
Wow. Doesn't that just look so cool guys? Man, I'm so happy that I spent $3 on this game (I didn't really, for some reason I was furnished a key by the developer, but my point remains).
Moving onto level 4 and you begin to realize that all semblance of a story we were promised in level 1 is long gone by now. It is just a stepping stone for you to get the "Dash" ability. That's literally it. You go to the back right corner of the map, flip a switch, and dash into the blue boundary like you're speed running Wind Waker. I actually have nothing else to say about this level, so let's move on.
Level 5 is actually really cool. Not because it's good or anything, it's another very simple level where your goal is to pick up the torches and hand them to the skeleton man who is waiting atop the rocks so he can give you a boost pad up to the hot air balloon. No, this level is cool because it really shows off how awesome this graphical style could be if only it were in a better game. If you turn it off and go to normal base Unity engine vision, it looks like trash, but the pixel heaven that I'm looking at? I wish I could have more of this. Hell, I might even spend money to see it. But uhhhh, yeah, that's all for this level. Pick up like 5 torches, hand them to Mr. Bones, move on. These levels really do get shorter and shorter from here on out.
Level 6 is a nightmare. I absolutely hate it, but I will at least give it to the developer that it was the longest level I've played so far. If I could go the rest of my life without ever having to use this airplane again, though, I would die a very happy man. You start off on a cloud next to an airplane. Now, if you're thinking what I'm thinking, you see and airplane and the hot air balloon and think "Oh, neat, there's the end." Well, get ready to learn The Victor's buddy, because you're going to have a real bad time. If you do what I did, you miss out on a quite essential skill you need to have. "Double Jump". Without it, the next level is literally impossible. I spent about 15 minutes in level 7 trying to figure out how the hell I was supposed to beat it before the realization set in that I was going to have to start the game all over again just to get one stupid ability, and worse, use the plane again.
Oh yeah, the plane. When I said earlier that this game seemed like a shitty ROBLOX game, I meant it. This fucking plane controls just like what an bad, old, decrepit, abandoned ROBLOX level with a plane in it controls. Genuinely awful. The ONLY silver lining is that if you aren't accelerating, the plane basically doesn't move so you can get your affairs back in order. If it weren't for that, I don't think this level could be beatable. Beating this level is fairly simple though. You jump down and talk to a suicidal guy, he tells you about the guy up top, you get the double jump ability from him after doing some more parkour, and you fly the plane to level 7.
Now we are on to the final level. Hasn't this been a magical ride together? There is genuinely a pretty good chance that you have spent more time reading this review than you would be spending playing to this point in the game. If that doesn't tell you something about this game, I don't know what will.
Level 7 is where I had to turn off the pixelated graphic design. Actually that's a lie, I turned it off in level 6 because I at least wanted a chance to beat it with the plane, but level 7 didn't make me want to turn it on again. It's not because it looks bad, but because everything is too spaced out and it genuinely is too hard for me to know where I'm going half the time. The level itself is simple too, though I will say hat's off to the developer for actually incorporating something from a previous level into the game more than once. In level 4 we learned that the blue transparent material can be phased through if you dash. Once you get over to the obstacle course on level 7, you see that same material and it clicks in your mind "don't dash here". I didn't, and I was able to make my way easily to the top where I learned "Glide".
What does glide do, the children who decided to read this review in between ad breaks of Cocomelon videos might be asking? It let's you use the space bar to float in the air after you jump and glide to the next hot air balloon. Like the other abilities in this game, it's a means to an end. Thankfully for us, that end is the end of the game so outside of writing this review I never have to touch this fucking game again.
Hotdog Quest: One With Everything is not a good game. I would not recommend anyone to buy it outside of the novelty of owning the game, and maybe getting very drunk to challenge yourself into beating it. This game is the 2020's equivalent of Bad Rats. You don't own it because it's good, you own it because one of your shitty friends gifted it to you back in the day before Steam actually let you reject gifts.
Would I recommend trying it out? Maybe when it's on sale. Maybe. Or, you know, buy it and beat it within two hours. That should be relatively easy to do, and uhh, you know? Whatever you do after you beat it within those two hours is completely up to you. Who am I to control you? You're an adult probably, live your own life. Definitely gift a few copies to your friends though, make sure you give them the Scarlett Letter, or should I say, Scarlett Hotdog.
I hate this game, but it gave me an excuse to eat a hot dog