CAPTION: Google is a gigantic company (or family of companies) that has a huge variety of digital services. Google Doodles are definitely one of my favourite.
Intro
Posts like these don't really need an intro. You know what you're getting (In case you don't Google Doodles are temporary changes to the Google logo to commemorate special events and cultural icons. Just wait- you'll see one eventually.) But first I thank the Google Doodle developers for their sense of culture and fun, and for making boring days just a bit better. Enjoy!
#5: Celebrating Pizza (2021)
I probably like this game more than actual pizza. The premise is simple - you have a limited number of slices to cut pizzas into slices that fit the ingredient requirements. It starts out quite simple, but as the various ingredients are more sporadically spread across the pizza (really, who baked these?) and the number of cuts you get dwindles, things get harder. Likewise, the types of pizza you operate on become more unique, starting with simple Margherita (the name might seem complicated, but it's cheese, tomatoes, and basil), then progressing to more unique teriyaki mayonnaise to "Desert", a pizza filled with sweets. I like this because it's quick, satisfying, and requires some amount of skill.
#4: Valentine's Day 2017
Two things that will always endure: A good story and cute animals. Valentine's Day 2017 combines both in a sweet 2D minigame where you play as a pangolin, an endangered animal similar to anteaters, armadillos, and sloths, that tries to find a gift on the way to meeting his sweetheart who lives far, far away. You navigate the pangolin through various nations, collecting materials for your gifts, while avoiding traps and trying to get your best time on all the 'levels'. The simple mechanics certainly add to this doodle, but the best part is the hilarious and wholesome ending when the pangolin couple meets at last. I like this because of its smile-bringing story.
#3: Garden Gnomes
This game is probably the most addicting of all the doodles. Using only your space bar, you launch a garden gnome into the air using a catapult, and try to keep it flying through strategically bringing your gnome back to the ground to take advantage of bouncy mushrooms, momentum-inducing logs, and butterflies. You get more points for how far your gnome goes, with my high score being around 1600, though it's possible to keep up your gnome forever if you don't lose forward momentum or hit a mud patch (which stops the gnome). There are other nice details in the doodle: The cast of garden gnomes you can choose to launch is of all sorts of shapes and sizes, each with their aerodynamic benefits, and if you manage to bounce your gnome very high you will reach the stars and see comical fake gnome constellations. This game has great play-again value (and again, and again, and again) for any case of boredom.
#2: Halloween 2018/2022
Despite the fact that, oddly, I can no longer join a server on this game, this doodle is amazing. It's the exciting rush of adrenaline as you, a ghost, team up with three other players to gather small dots of light for your side, and brutally steal long chains of them from the opponents. It's the goofy and fun accessories you can put on your ghost avatar, such as pirate hats, crowns, and cat heads for various achievements. And of course, it's the spooky holiday spirit from the maze-like game map, which gets you even more excited for Halloween evening especially when you play on the day. The Google developers brought back this interactive doodle for the 2022 Halloween, and I hope they continue to revive it in years to come, in an endless battle between purple and green. I love this game's quick games, cooperative nature, and goofy accessories.
#1: Champion Island (2021)
Fittingly, "Champion Island" has become the champion of this post. The largest doodle game created so far, for the grandest collection of sporting events over a two-week period, and it's no wonder this game is so well-known. A pixelated ode to the confusingly named 2020 Tokyo Summer Olympics, Champion Island has you play as Lucky, a calico cat on a quest to become the greatest athlete of them all. Lucky must collect seven scrolls from beating seven sporting minigames, from ping pong to rugby, each with their designated master. I have never beat the game on any of my devices (I always struggle doing Mountain Climbing). Just as entertaining are the many "side quests" that you can optionally do, which all have you helping the unique, varied citizens of the island and collecting trophies for your kindness. The open-world doodle resembles a rudimentary mobile game in itself, with the minigames inside enough to be their own doodles. There are also clear Japanese influences: Your scoring in each game is based on three dango (a Japanese snack made with rice flour), you have to play rugby against Oni. There's so much I love about this game - just try it!
So Yeah...
Whenever I do these "Ranked" posts, which has only been once before this, I realize that I'm not writing about anything unique, and so the chances of this specific post being found get even lower. Yet, maybe because I believe my opinions are original and worth sharing (they aren't) I trudge on with writing. Sometimes I feel like I'm adding a voice to a sea of nose, hoping someone will hear it. Usually, that someone ends up being myself. I guess the moral is remember to write, listen, draw, dance, cry, whatever you do for fun- for yourself first and foremost. It's hard to know yourself.
-Tomatobean
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