Playing with gravity can be fun, but it wasn't in this demo. http://www.nintendoworldreport.com/impressionsArt.cfm?artid=18815 Majesco had their upcoming 3D platformer, Flip's Twisted World, on display, and while its premise of gravity manipulation was appealing, the demo's controls made for a thoroughly frustrating hands-on experience.
Flip is the stereotypical 3D platformer: it features bright graphics and a friendly-looking magician's apprentice who must reclaim his master's lost artifacts and gain new abilities in a variety of worlds. Flip attacks with tools and spells he acquires during his adventure, such as a lightning bolt (which works like a taser), a heavy book (for smacking), and ice blocks. Unfortunately, I had to hold a button and push the analog stick in one of several directions to change my weapon, not unlike in Trauma Center: Second Opinion, and selecting the one desired was overly difficult.
The game's namesake mechanic was also rendered highly frustrating by poor controls in the demo. The ability to change gravity's direction in any of the coordinal directions at will sounds interesting enough, but the controls were not intuitive. I was encouraged by the representative to change the direction of gravity by holding down the B button and twisting and flicking the remote. Unfortunately, the demo responded to the Remote's orientation rather spastically, and the visual cues were not terribly clear, making it difficult to lock in the desired direction. Even worse, I found myself accidently initiating gravity manipulation when I wanted to switch weaponsÂ…and then with no way to exit this mode without altering gravity against my wishes. The end result was a series of instant deaths as I fell into the sky/bottomless pit. I couldn't get a feel for the level design. Gravity could also be manipulated via the D-pad, which worked slightly better, but may not be in the final game according to Majesco.
While the demo's graphics were a tad bland, the music (composed by Tommy Tallarico) was very pleasant. The game's concept is sound enough, so hopefully Frozen North Productions will revisit the controls to make the final release a more user-friendly experience.
Topic: IMPRESSIONS: Flip's Twisted World (Read 1760 times)
