Raspberry Forest

Night has fallen on the forest and your friends are lost in the dark. Carry your torch, follow the raspberries, and outwit the Wolf King to bring everyone home.

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What it is

Raspberry Forest is a cosy little rescue adventure set in a snowy wood at night. You play a small hero holding the only light for miles — a flickering torch that pushes back the dark just far enough to see the next few steps. Somewhere out in the trees your friends are hiding, cold and lost, and the forest belongs to wolves. Your job is to light the way, find everyone, and get past the beasts that guard the path, all the way up to the Wolf King himself.

It’s the game that started the whole arcade, and it sets the tone for everything else here: warm pixel art, a gentle sense of adventure, and just enough challenge to keep you leaning in.

How to play

Move — drag the on-screen joystick with your left thumb, or use the arrow keys / WASD on a computer.

Action — tap the button (or press the key) to swing at a wolf when it gets close.

Your torch lights the area around you — stay near the glow and you’ll always see what’s coming.

Rescue your lost friends by reaching them, then make for the goal.

The goal

Each level asks you to find your lost friends and reach the end of the path while dealing with the wolves (and, later, bears) in your way. Clear all four levels — from the first snowy trail to the Bear King’s Hollow — and you’ve won. Because every level is timed, the real challenge is doing it fast: the quickest rescues land on the leaderboard.

Tips & strategy

Keep moving toward the light. The torch only reveals a small circle, so hesitating in the dark is how wolves surprise you. Commit to a direction.
Follow the raspberries. They tend to line the safe path — treat them as breadcrumbs toward your next friend.
Face a wolf before you swing. Your attack hits in the direction you’re moving, so line up before you commit.
Learn the boss pattern. The Wolf King and the Bear King repeat their moves — a couple of attempts and you’ll read them, then you can dodge and punish safely.
For a leaderboard time, plan your route. Once you know where the friends are, the fastest players take the straightest safe line rather than exploring.

Behind this game

Raspberry Forest was the first game on the shelf, and a lot of what makes Hank’s Games Hank’s Games was figured out here: the torch-glow lighting, the snowy palette, and the idea that a whole game should fit in one self-contained file. The single trickiest part was touch controls — making a floating joystick that feels right under a kid’s thumb on an iPad took more iterations than the wolves did. It’s also where we learned to lock down little things that trip players up, like accidentally typing movement keys into the initials box on the high-score screen.

Updates

Grown to four levels

Added Greenwood and the Bear King’s Hollow, bringing bears and campfires into the mix alongside the wolves, plus a close-range hand-punch attack for tight spots.

Kinder on touch

Reworked the iPad touch handling so the joystick tracks properly, fixed movement keys leaking into the initials entry, and added clear “back to the arcade” links.

Mobile-zoom hardening

Stopped phones from pinch-zooming the page when the joystick and action button are held at the same time.

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