Title:

Price: 400 Points

Countries: Canada, France, Italy, Spain, United Kingdom, United States
Languages: English

Publisher’s Description
Artoon chronicles the adventures of Art as he bounces his way through a variety of visual artworks. Can you earn those elusive top rankings in this score-attack psychedelic platformer?

What We Think:
Artoon is a of the QBert genus – requiring the player to tag squares by bouncing on them, awarding points for avoiding repeat squares unless required and threatening to toss the character into the depths of oblivion if he somehow bounces off the map altogether.

Adding to this, and perhaps the source of the game’s namesake, is the colorful techno-centric music and graphics reminiscent of Lumines Live – one of the best games for the Xbox 360 ever made.  The ever-changing backdrops and score keep this game fresh and the gameplay itself is always challenging.  For 400 points it is a steal.  I was also reminded of some of the later challenges in the vastly underrated psychedelic Xbox platformer Psychonauts wherein the hero is running around a huge cube being chased by dozens of science experiments in an attempt to excorcise his psychic demons.

My only point of contention is with the title of the game itself: not knowing what it was, I inferred from its title that it might be some sort of paint program.  Perhaps something a little more enticing or creative as a title would bring this excellent effort the audience it deserves.

SUPER COOL BONUS:
The creator has an extra cool bonus: you can download the Artoon soundtrack for free, and remixes are encouraged.  Direct Download.

Rating: ★★★★☆ 

Check out the main site at www.okgamescompany.com

Have you played Artoon? What were your impressions?

Title: Machiavelli’s Ascent
Creator: Naturally Formed Studios
Genre: Platformer

Price: 200 Points

Countries: Canada, France, Italy, Spain, United Kingdom, United States
Languages: English

Publisher’s Description
Better than bottled water. Experience being a negatively buoyant jellyfish who wants nothing more than for the sweet warm sun to kiss his hydrostatic skeleton. Use flow controls to glide through the ocean’s depths as you ascend in this liquid platformer. Maintain your ascent by gathering melodious nutrient bubbles as you play, chaining collisions to build up aurally stimulating combos.

What We Think:
This game is so fast-paced, it may be best suited for the mind-reader Kreskin to resolve how to negotiate where the next “food source” that propels your jellyfish avatar upward may be in order to solve it.

Not that that is a bad thing – but it really keeps you on your toes.  Er, tentacles. One of the most challenging/frustrating elements is that missing a food source means starting back at the beginning; there is little margin for error and so you feel a bit like you are in a fever-dream where you are running from an unknown assailant and somehow your feet are just not able to contend with gravity sufficiently to pick up any steam.

I can’t see it isn’t a standout in the XNA catalog, but it isn’t a game that rewards the gamer sufficiently to merit more than a few sustained minutes of nerve-battering excitement.

So points for design, innovation and implementation, but a few less because it’s just too damn exasperating.

Rating: ★★★☆☆ 

Would you be interested in playing this type of game?

Title: sin(Surfing)
Creator: Raph
Genre: Sports & Recreation

Price: 200 Points

Countries: Canada, France, Italy, Spain, United Kingdom, United States
Languages: English

Publisher’s Description
Ever wished you could surf inside an oscilloscope? Well now you can! Play sin(Surfing) now with this 360 version of the TIGSource Procedural Generation Compo entry by twohalf and Sifu Peng!

What We Think:
We love the idea of coasting along the crazy wavy surface of a sine wave.  Though at first the concept seemed perhaps too simplistic, it quickly became apparent that this is in fact a highly addictive titles that is technically very well implemented.  The player is consistently challenged to attempt a variety of stunts, like doing a series of 360 flips in the air and landing his or her board safely back on the surface of the wave.  As the game progresses safely, the music speeds up and begins to warp, causing the waveform to get more and more challening to ride.

Another neat little addition is the realtime clock display at the bottom left.  It has nothing to do with the gameplay, but its cool to be able to check the time without looking away from the game.

For a fair 200 Microsoft Points, it gets our salute.

Rating: ★★★★☆ 

Would you be interested in playing this type of game?