A Hat in Time

A 2017 3D platformer by Gears for Breakfast and Spiritual Successor to Banjo-Kazooie and the rest of its "collect-a-thon" sub-genre. Noted for being one of the few Kickstarter games that actually wound up delivering on most of its promises.

Hat Kid awakens to another day on her space ship which is returning her home, currently 5 light years away, from an unknown departure point. Leaving her room Hat Kid is met with a demand for a toll from a member of the mafia of the planet below her, who has inexplicably flown up from the planet unaided. After Hat Kid's refusal to allow him entry, he busts through a window. In the ensuing decompression the time pieces which power her ship are sucked out of the ship and land on the planet below.

After a short team-up with native girl Mustache Girl to retrieve the lost fuel, Mustache Girl learns that these hourglasses can reverse time, a power Hat Kid knows of but refuses to use. Angered by Hat Kid's refusal to correct the many wrongs of the planet, Mustache Girl declares Hat Kid her enemy and sets out to acquire the pieces on her own. Hat Kid must now collect the time pieces while beating her former friend to them.


 * Adorkable: Hat Kid, definitely.
 * All There in the Manual: Hat Kid is never actually called that in game, instead referred to by names like "some girl", "small child", or "little girl".
 * Anthropomorphic Animal: Cooking Cat, the rival owls and penguins, as well as the crows and the goats. Averted by the seals in the DLC, while capable of speech they have no hands are explicitly unsuited to the manual labor they are employed in.
 * Anti-Hero: Hat Kid really has no desire to fight evil or right wrongs, simply wanting to collect the Time Pieces so she can go home. (Although, her journal does reveal that she's kind of excited about the idea of acting in movies.) Indeed, she's willing to help or oppose anyone to do this, and is shown capable of cruel acts, like destroying paintings with imprisoned souls within.
 * Bad Liar: The C.A.W. agents. They all tell Hat Kid that they're owls, despite obviously being crows.
 * Batman Can Breathe in Space: Hat Kid herself not only breathes in space, she can survive landing on the planet via atmospheric re-entry. Also, the Mafia at the start.
 * The Can Kicked Him: The Toilet of Doom! Truthfully, this chapter in Subcon Woods is arguably one of the most fun boss in the game.
 * Deal with the Devil: The Snatcher forces Hat Kid into several that force her to complete various task in the Subcon Forest for him..
 * Death Seeker: The fox Spirits in Subcon Forest want to go out in a literal blaze of glory; Hat Kid can help them do this.
 * Double Jump
 * Evil Brit: Moustache Girl
 * Expy: The Snatcher is a combination of Stan from Okage and the "cursed" chests from Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door.
 * Fantastic Slurs: Peck is supposedly a bird's version of the F-word.
 * Film Noir: The Conductor's movie parodies this Trope, being a lampoon of Murder on the Orient Express.
 * Fun with Acronyms: C.A.W., the Crow Agent Watch. The DLC chapter is accessed through a passage in the Dirty Laundry Cleaner 3000.
 * Gameplay and Story Integration: During the final boss
 * Get Back Here Boss: The Spectacled Mafia. On the third part of Chapter One, Hat Kid falls in a mud puddle, and when she confronts him, he thinks she's a "slimy alien" and runs from her. After a chase across the rooftops, he gives her a Time Piece to get her to leave him alone.
 * Hopeless Boss Fight: Queen Vanessa, if she can even be called a "boss". There's no way to fight her, Hat Kid's only chance is to run.
 * Human Aliens: Hat Kid; Cooking Cat even lampshades this, telling her, "I kind of expected aliens to be green, and probably with a thirst for flesh". Ironic, as this is coming from a talking cat in a chef's outfit...
 * Husky Russkie: The Mafia Cooks are Dumb Muscle goons with exaggerated Russian accents.
 * Kid Hero: Hat Kid.
 * Lethal Chef: All the Mafias. Cook Cat claims that if anyone actually ate their cooking they could die, and he has to replace their food with his own to make sure nobody does. This seems confirmed when Hat Kid investigates their kitchen, which is unhygienic and disgusting.
 * Little Red Fighting Hood: Aside from the moustache, Moustache Girl fits the traditional description of Red Riding Hood, and about halfway through the game she becomes very dangerous.
 * Only Known by Their Nickname: Every character except DJ Grooves, Rumbi (who isn't named in game) and Queen Vanessa.
 * Girls with Moustaches: Mustache Girl.
 * Heroic Mime: Hat Kid.
 * Hopeless Boss Fight: Hat Kid cannot fight Queen Vanessa and hope to win. The only way to "defeat" her is to hide from her and make it to the attic, thereby completing the level.
 * Meat Versus Veggies: Cooking Cat asks Hat Kid's opinion on this; her preference is up to the player.
 * Nice Hat: Hat Kid, of course. She starts with a top hat, but can collect special yarn to craft several Nice Hats, many with a special function.
 * No OSHA Compliance: The reason Hat Kid is in this mess to begin with; her spaceship actually has a window on the bridge that opens. When the Mafia goon comes to demand a toll, he forces it open, causing the 40 hourglasses that fuel the ship to be blown out, along with Hat Kid herself.
 * Noodle Incident: It's not known why Moustache Girl has a moustache, nor why she hates the Mafia so much.
 * Not So Above It All: While she has no interest in being a heroic crime fighter, Hat Kid's journal suggests she is rather excited at the idea of being an actress; so long as she doesn't have to sing.
 * One-Hit-Point Wonder: The optional 1-Hit Hero Badge turns the player character into one.
 * Paper-Thin Disguise: The only reason you can even tell C.A.W Agents are supposed to be in disguise is they tell you their supposed role.
 * Plot Coupon: Time Pieces, hourglass-shaped things that Hat Kid needs to fuel her ship.
 * Same Story, Different Names: The Conductor's movies are all "train themed westerns".
 * Self-Imposed Challenge: Encouraged by the 1-Hit Hero Badge
 * Single Gender Race: Downplayed. No female Mafia are seen and a pair of bathrooms are labeled as "Mafia" and "Also Mafia". However, a painting Hat Kid finds shows a bunch of them with a group of women, so this may have been different once.
 * Sir Swearsalot: The Conductor with the Fantastic Slur peck.
 * Stealth-Based Mission:
 * Many of the Chapters in Act 2 are this, requiring Hat Kid to navigate the levels while avoiding being spotted by the Express Owls or C.A.W. Agents.
 * Queen Vanessa's Manor is a Stealth Mission worthy of Silent Hill, where Hat Kid can only hide from Vanessa while making her way from the basement to attic..
 * Swiss Cheese Security: Despite being a space ship in orbit, several characters can come and go from Hat Kid's spaceship uninvited. The vault holding the ship's hourglass fuel supply can be opened simply from decompression.
 * Third-Person Person: Mafia.
 * Planet of Steves: Also Mafia, who address others of their kind as "Fellow Mafia".
 * Unwinnable by Design: There are not enough coins in game to obtain everything from the vending machine that gives cosmetic items. The developers have stated this was intentional to encourage playing mod levels which can contain additional coins.
 * Voice Grunting: An optional piece of equipment, explicitly in tribute to Banjo-Kazooie.
 * Wave Motion Gun: An optional piece of equipment allows the basic melee attack to generate one.
 * Well Intentioned Extremist: Mustache Girl intends to use the time travel powers of the time pieces to right wrongs.