Dangerous Ultimate Cartridge Kidnapper (or D.U.C.K. for short), is a collection of 100 retro-style NES-influenced microgames, which, in the reality of the game, have been found on a mysterious discarded multigame cartridge for an 8-bit console called the QES (now, what on earth could that be based on?!) In the game’s single player story mode, the games are held together by the context of a well-presented story involving the game’s duck protagonists being sucked into the cartridge, forcing them to play through the 100 games to be released from their cart-based captivity. This story is told using appealing, well-drawn cartoon presentation, but should you have no interest in the story mode (though I’d recommend that you do play it), there’s also the option to just have D.U.CK.’s minigames thrown at you one after the other in the game’s endless mode, which adds longevity to game, and ensuing that it will remain enjoyable to play once you’ve finished with the story mode

So, then, with a wide selection genres represented in D.U.C.K.’s microgames, including puzzlers, shooters, and even Game & Watch-style games, and a decent number of game modes, including a compelling story mode and a relentless endless mode for single players, as well as a well-implemented multiplayer party mode, Dangerous Ultimate Cartridge Kidnapper certainly does a lot of things right, but there is a “but” coming, (and, sadly, it’s a big enough but to pique the interest of Sir Mixalot!), what stops D.U.C.K. being up there with the true classics of the microgame genre, such as Wario Ware and Bishi Bashi Special is that the microgames are just that little bit too complicated, especially considering these are games that  you play for seconds at a time using just the thumbstick or D-pad and one or two buttons.

The best collections of microgames make it obvious what you have to do with the most cursory of glances at each game, and they throw the games at you thick and fast, so you don’t really have time to think about what you’re doing, but in D.U.C.K.’s games it isn’t always obvious what the objectives are, and working out what you have to do can interrupt the high-speed flow of the game. It’s a shame, because some of the games are based on fun premises that could’ve been quite a bit more enjoyable if they’d just been simplified a little, and all of the microgames on D.U.C.K. also do a good job of evoking the look and feel of the 8-bit NES (and Game & Watch) era of gaming, which is very appealing to those of us who fondly remember those days of gaming. All that said, the difficulty of the games on Dangerous Ultimate Cartridge Kidnapper is offset somewhat by having the option of practicing them before having a go that “counts”.

However, the very fact that practice goes are offered on Dangerous Ultimate Cartridge Kidnapper’s microgames does perhaps suggest that the games are just too difficult to begin with, and that’s even taking into consideration that a number of difficulty options are offered. However, if a particular game does become too frustratingly hard, you can choose to lose a life and skip to the next one, so you needn’t stay stuck on a game you’re struggling with.

Dangerous Ultimate Cartridge Kidnapper offers an intriguing premise for a microgame collection, and it really is beautifully presented, and it really does do so much right, but for me, the games are just to complicated to make the D.U.CK. experience as fun as it could’ve been.  However, if you like the idea of a microgame collection that offers a bit more of a challenge than most, then you might well get some enjoyment out of Dangerous Ultimate Cartridge Kidnapper, and its budget price means that if you do like the sound of D.U.C.K., you can take a punt on it without taking too much of a risk.

Dangerous Ultimate Cartridge Kidnapper has been developed by Duck Team and is published by Valkyrie Initiative. D.U.C.K. is out now on Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4, Xbox (version reviewed), and PC.