With Sonic not quite living up to fan's expectations these days, it's fair to say Mario has won over the blue blur as the king of platforming. However, a new challenger has been born. Say hello to 'Splosion Man. 'Splosion Man for the Xbox Live Arcade has you 'sploding, running, obstacle dodging, and puzzle solving as a strange hyper-active experiment with the power to 'splode around a 2.5D science... For a lack of a better word: lab.
'Splosion Man has it all: Charm, great music, nice visuals, hillarious humor, and most importantly, it's really damn fun. As 'Splosion Man, your ability to 'splode lets you triple jump, destroy things (including scientists who turn into slices of meat), deflect missiles, set off bombs to launch yourself, and wall jump. It may sound like a rather simple platformer, but there's a lot more to this super-challenging 'splodeathon than meets the eye. The first few levels are pretty simple, just 'splode (jump) and wall jump your way through the levels, with the odd puzzle or enemy. But then it gets hard very quickly. Moving platforms and bombs flying about above a quickly rising sea of deadly acid, an un-solvable puzzle involving swarms of robots firing lasers at you, a combination of both, a giant robot running after you while you try to 'splode your way around an obstacle course, and don't get me started on the bosses. Altogether, the gameplay perfectly combines fast-paced 'sploding fun with rock hard puzzle solving and platforming.
Although 'Splosion Man isn't just fun for it's gameplay, but everything else is fun, not to mention very funny too. For example, the visuals. Very fun and cartoony. Better than boring realistic graphics. And the music and humor? You just need to listen to this song to get the idea.
I really can't fault this game. Quite frankly, it's a masterpiece. 50 levels of awesome, as well as plenty of multiplayer levels to play with friends and people online, really fun, very funny, and has tons of charm. Great for high-score lovers too, and for people who like to collect everything in-game. (There's a cake in each level, which the achievement insists isn't a Portal reference) The only bad little things that I can pick out are the loading screen isn't great, you're left wanting more levels, and the bosses can be very frustrating.
This game earns a spot in my top ten list of platformers, and that's including Mario games and 3D platformers. A great achievement for 'Splosion Man. If you have an Xbox 360, get it. You won't regret it.
94%
Oh, and here's a little treat for you guys!
