Cuckoo Run review: getting chickens out of the farm

If chickens tried to escape a farm, this is probably how they’d look like.

Cuckoo Run is an endless runner by Philippine game development studio Zeenoh Games where you play as a chicken trying to escape the farm. If you’ve played Zombie Tsunami by Mobigame S.A.R.L. before, the gameplay is pretty much the same minus the zombies.

(See: Zeenoh Games: what it’s like to be a small indie game developer in the Philippines)

You start with a single chicken. This chicken is controlled by swiping up and down on the screen to dodge obstacles ranging from bombs and claw traps to standing pigs and running cows. Along the way, you will encounter and pick up eggs and chicks (and by that, I mean young chickens) that will mature with your flock as you run. Collecting enough eggs will unlock new kinds of chickens, such as the Warrior Chicken and the Midas Chicken. You also have to collect egg coins and get power ups, which add to your total score.

Of course, controlling a big flock can be difficult and you will lose some chickens, especially when the game begins to speed up. Some will get caught in an explosion, get rammed by a cow, or simply get held back by a pig standing in the middle of the road. You won’t be penalized by the number of chickens you lose, but it definitely lessens your chances of surviving. It’s game over once there are no chickens (or chicks) left to carry on the dream of escaping this farm.

One thing you’ll find missing in Cuckoo Run is a tutorial, or an instructional pop-up. If you haven’t tried Zombie Tsunami before and haven’t read Cuckoo Run’s description on its Google Play page, you’ll have to figure out how to play on your own. No matter how simple a game is, instructions should be there for users who won’t understand the gameplay right off the bat. I mean, Flappy Bird was a simple game, but it still came with rudimentary instructions.

I like how the user interface is easy to navigate and doesn’t feel cluttered, but the overall design for the menu and pop ups needs more work. I particularly liked the background, although there were some weird gaps like in the example below:

What I really like about Cuckoo Run, however, is its comical design. I’m not fond of crazy-looking characters, but that bird really made me want to save it. It looks like it had decided what it wanted to do (read: get out of the farm), but had no idea what that meant, so it was up to me to lend bird brain a hand and get at least one of them out alive. I haven’t succeeded yet, though. I’m sorry, chickens.

As for what makes this game different from Zombie Tsunami, and makes me want to play it over that? I didn’t feel sorry for the zombies that got left behind.