Joystiq Review: Bit.Trip: Beat (WiiWare)
Bit.Trip: Beat is a harsh mistress. Never before have I played a game this tough, let alone one with such a difficult first level. Still, as hard as it is to climb that quirky, puzzle mountain, reaching its summit was a rewarding experience as I employed my floating bar of justice to stop the unrelenting army of pixels that sought to sneak past me.
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There isn't much of a premise to Bit.Trip: Beat. There's just this one mandate: block everything that comes toward you ever. As a magical bar, the galaxy's last hope against the onslaught of pixels seeking to destroy it, you'll face off against a variety of different pixel enemies (including some really cheap ones that match the color of the background!), twisting the Wiimote to move up and down accordingly.
The action all goes in time to the soundtrack, with each blocked pixel representing a note. Miss a pixel, and the song skips a beat. Miss enough pixels, and the game goes black and white, alá classic Pong. Miss more pixels at that point (it happens ... a lot), and it's time to retry the song. Add to that a light show dancing in the background that would make George Clinton remove his glasses and exclaim, "WOW" to his Parliament Funkadelic, and you have a pretty package. Care to take a guess as to how else the game is unique? It's the toughest thing ever!
Seriously, the game almost seemed to laugh at me the entire time I played, by throwing me an endless amount of pixels that no mere mortal could block. If I were to take a guess, I'd say this game is marketed toward the clock-hanging, mad scientist crowd, because you'd need to own a Delorean to catch all of these pixels.
As tough as it can be though, the game is still fun. It's a charming homage to an era of gaming's past, and will likely be a pleasant experience for anyone that remembers owning a 2600.
