Shoot monsters and save blobs in Hopeless 3: Dark Hollow Earth

Hopeless 3: Dark Hollow Earth is a free mobile rail shooter in which you guide a rickety cart full of cartoony blobs through a sinister underworld, rescuing your fellow blobs and shooting the monsters that threaten them. The charmingly simple graphics and gameplay contrast with the game’s horrific monsters and moody, dark horror-influenced soundtrack.

Into the underworld with gun and cart

Hopeless 3: Dark Hollow Earth has a pretty simple gameplay concept at heart: your cart rolls forward along its track, and your job is simply to tap on enemies and other targets to shoot them. Within this, though, there’s some variation: hit certain targets, for instance, and they’ll drop down and sweep through your enemies. During levels, you’ll accumulate coins, which you can spend between levels to upgrade your cart and weapons. As the levels advance, enemies become more common and more challenging, so warm up your tapping finger. Beyond that, there’s not much to it. You drive and shoot, with only more complex levels and new types of enemies to keep things interesting. Replaying levels to save more blobs, earn more coins and generally improve your performance can be a lot of fun, especially on the more challenging later levels.

Simple fun for a lazy hour

Hopeless 3: Dark Hollow Earth is a cute-looking rail shooter, but ultimately it doesn’t stretch much beyond that. Still, it’s a fun way to while away some time.