Splosion Man XBLA Review

Written by Knight Carver Tuesday, 11 August 2009 09:37

Splosion Man is a platforming action game at heart. Created by Twisted Pixel and released exclusively for download over Xbox Live, this sleek, polished title is well worth the humble 800 point asking price.

As Splosion Man, the game begins with you escaping from a laboratory to wreak havoc, payback, and retribution on all scientists, robots, and others, as you progress to the exit of each level. You have the inherent ability to splode (jump) three times in succession, before needing to land on a horizontal surface (or slide down a vertical surface) so that you can recharge. You can use splodes to help you jump over gaps, propel yourself off walls, destroy scientists (who disintegrate into different cuts of deli meats), detonate barrels, and destroy walls to name but a few things.

Splosion Man has been blessed with amazing level design. Levels are well thought out with almost perfectly placed checkpoints and levels are packed with ‘omfg that’s cool’ moments. As levels progress the difficulty increases ensuring that your timing and the placement of each splode becomes more and more critical. Although some levels will result in you trying time and time again, never does the process become too frustrating or infuriating. Many a time as I progressed across a level, I couldn’t help but smile about the way I came to my demise. Levels are varied and exciting enough to ensure that you want just one more go, or that you want to do just one more level. Should you struggle too much and die an arbitrary number of times, the game will give you the option of taking ‘the coward’s way’ though I don’t recommend it. (You’ll know what I mean if you take the option!) Still, it’s great that the game has provided this option to ensure that the game is accessible to everyone and allows the gamer to move on and return if the sense of frustration does become unbearable.

Splosion Man also allows you to play through 50 levels with up to three others over Xbox Live. In this mode you need to work together to achieve your goal, with players often given the responsibility of activating switches or timing splodes off one another.

The menu screen is neat and attractive while the upbeat background music is fun and slightly comical with a spy-ish edge. Options include single player and multi player games as well as a robust leaderboard that allows you to easily compare times and scores with your friends. Along with the usual suspects like the ability to check achievements and fiddle with options, there’s also an option to download content. At this stage no additional levels are available, but the placement of this in the title screen indicates that some is to be expected. Options themselves are fairly stock. You have the option to configure your controller, but since you only need one button (and wonderful timing); it’s not really something you’ll need to look at. An appreciated option is the ‘Extras’ which tells you what levels you need to complete to obtain two free gamerpics and a free premium Splosion Man theme. On top of this Splosion Man holds the honour of being the first arcade game to enable you to unlock accessories for your avatar, though this won’t be available until after August 11th. Now that’s value for money!

The Music/Sound in this game is simply outstanding. From comical plane noises as Splosion Man runs with arms outstretched to the delightful ‘donut song’ that plays upon picking up a rather portly scientist, the sound is simply first rate.

Splosion Man is a visually attractive game, although one slight criticism may be the slightly repetitive look of the 50 levels. Regardless, everything is smooth and polished and the camera is well designed to pull out or zoom in on the odd occasion to alter your view (usually for the better). There are numerous simple and funny animations that Splosion Man may burst into whilst running or being propelled through the air that adds to the fun of the game. Though the action takes place over a 2D space, the world and characters themselves have a striking 3D appearance.

Splosion Man, quite simply, is a wonderful game that I highly recommend. It is loaded with replayability with the promise of DLC, the option for speed runs, and the jostling for positions on the both global and friends leaderboards.
Splosion Man is fun, addictive, and quite simply a must have.

"And all who saw him were 'sploded, for he was the fire and they were but meat."



TGV Score: 92/100

The Good:
• Fun and addictive
• Wonderful level design with some puzzle elements
• Free Unlockables
• The Donut Song


The Bad:
• Some repetition in level design
• The odd frustrating moment which requires impeccable timing
• Boss battles are tedious and frustrating

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