A good heartfelt scream can be just what a game needs. Mims Beginning wouldn’t be half as charming if the alien race you control didn’t have such brilliant screams. They scream when they’re on fire, when they’re scared, when they’re bored. They’re screamers and I love them for it.
Taking notes from Populous, Mims Beginning has you guide a lost alien race to build cities and gather resources, all the while being threatened bigger meaner species.
The game is wonderfully colourful, making full use of outlandish blues and yellows for the plants and animals you encounter. I like, too, the bulbous buildings and objects that litter the game. It all gives the impression the Mims are not a race that can survive on their own. They’re too soft. A little like a kakapo.
The developers consider the game to be a light strategy title. You focus on expanding your home colony, collecting resources from your floating island and funnelling them into new developments. Left to their own devices, the mims will go about their business gathering what you need and working equipment you place for them but you can directly control the mims if you need to. You can also make use of godlike powers to foster plant growth or attack invading creatures.
As so many things are, if The Mims Beginning is to be completed it needs to find funding. Developer Squatting Penguins has turned to Indiegogo to source the monies necessary. they’re looking for $5,500 and have 46 days left in which to find the cash.
And here’s one of the best screamers in media doing what he does best: