Game Curmudgeons

PopCap is excelling in the sequels department lately. Bookworm Adventures 2, Bejeweled Twist, and now Zuma’s Revenge.  It’s every bit as great as the first and better, as one can expect, really. Now there’s a real dose of personality added to the game, new level mechanics, even surprisingly fun boss fights.

Zuma’s Revenge is still, at its core, an action-puzzle. You fire marbles at other marbles moving along a track, grouping them into threes to destroy them before they reach the end. If there are two of the same color bookending the ones you destroyed, they’ll be attracted and the ones up front pull backwards, along with any they’re touching. On top of that there’s a fair few power-ups which alter the mechanics of your shot and allow you to destroy with greater precision, and pull back the string of marbles. Skilled players will create gaps to shoot through for bonus points,  chain reactions of marble pulls, and learn to use the power-ups to their greatest effect. There’s a definite learning curve to the different level layouts, with tunnels, overpasses, and spirals, along with the additions of walls, multiple pads, and sliding tracks in Revenge.

Whereas Zuma left players in one place, a rotating platform to fire from, some levels in Zuma’s Revenge have multiple pads to jump between or sliding tracks, where you always fire straight ahead, but move left/right, or up/down (even while letting you fire left or right), Galaga style. It’s also the form used for boss fights, where a marble track is put in front of players that they have to shoot through to hit the boss, or activate special marbles, or use the power-ups to reach something that allows for damaging of a boss. Bosses meanwhile maneuver over the track, firing status effects. Scrambling marbles, movement, slowing shots, there’s a variety they use, and they’re all going to hamper your efforts to keep the marbles from reaching the end of the track while simultaneously trying to hit a moving target behind them. The boss fights tend to stick with the same basic idea, but twist it enough to make each a unique and damned fun challenge, and are a very welcome addition to the formula.

Zuma’s Revenge could honestly be played in an arcade, with a spinning dial and a few buttons, it’s got a quick pace and a solid challenge, a real combination of puzzle and action that’s rarely seen these days, or at least rarely done right. The pace and complexity move up with every level by adding features, colors, and speed without changing the core gameplay.  The adventure mode is, of course, the mainstay of the game, but on top of that there are challenge modes of several sorts. Like Challenge Mode, a short, timed mode emphasizing speed and accuracy. Heroic Frog, essentially Adventure’s harder replay, and Iron Frog, a brutal survival challenge for the real Zuma masters.

Zuma’s Revenge proudly boasts what might be PopCap’s best graphical work to date, able to run in HD. While the artistic style PopCap uses always holds strong, the extra resolution really shows. Balls are more detailed, the animation smoother, and the backgrounds brighter, crisper. While it is the kind of game that could be played with dots lacking any design at all, the extra color and texture brings the game to life. There aren’t a huge variety of objects or animations, but what there are, particularly special effect animations from power-ups like Lightning, really pop. Balls roll convincingly, smoothly, the framerate stays nice and high, and the backgrounds really do draw one into the game. Again, they aren’t needed, to be fair, a white background and black track outline would make the same game, but it’s the kind of thing that pulls you in.

The wonderful graphical presentation doesn’t hold up so much on the audio, though. Nothing bad, but nothing exceptional either. Stock sound effects and ones re-used from Zuma punctuate the game’s action, though they were certainly as fitting then as now. Balls clack together like billiards, chimes announce combos in a rising pitch with each successive addition, it’s certainly functional if not terribly exciting. I’d have liked a little more oomph to balls that collide from a greater distance, a little more zap with the Lightning, but there’s nothing that ever detracts either. It just never quite pops.

Of course, the game can be played with the speakers off, so in the end, the sound is a very small thing. It’s just a nice bonus that gives ideas of what’s going on and when you did something a little better than normal. Given the rock-solid gameplay and beautiful visual presentation it tends to fall to the wayside. It’d just be nice to get a little more rewarding audio cue when you do something excellent.

Zuma’s Revenge still pulls 4.5 stars. Excellent visuals, an addictive, fun, simple to pick up arcade style, and a few solid extra modes to increase the replay value would be enough, but the level variety and new level styles really raise the bar. It’s Tiki-riffic!

For the last few days, I’ve had a fever of 104 degrees. In attempts to kill time between Nyquil induced spells of unconciousness, I’ve played a little Afro Samurai, a little Amped 3, and a ton of Peggle: Dual Shot.

I really like the first two on the list, but I could only play a little at a time due to fever. And yet, if I’m awake, Peggle is always an option. It’s just that good. Hell, I’m playing it as a write this.

Let’s pretend that you’ve never heard of Peggle, haven’t already had it on PC for a year or two, and don’t know what the deal is.

Peggle is a game where you clear a board of pegs. To win players need to hit all the orange pegs, though there’s lots of blue pegs, a few green pegs, and traveling purple pegs as well.

There’s a ball launcher at the top of the screen. You aim, and you fire. Whatever your ball hits lights up and disappears, guided by physics. Simple as that, really.

Green pegs give special effects (an explosion that lights up all nearby pegs, or a guide that shows the angle the ball will take after the first bounce). Purple pegs give bonus points, and five of them result in the ball entering a bonus area where you can rack up a higher score by collecting gems AND earn an extra ball. And players get the shot back automatically just for getting to the bonus underground, which can result in two free shots easily.

It’s hard to describe Peggle beyond that. The concept is very simple, and there’s a multitude of brilliantly designed levels each with unique challenges. The artwork is top notch, with very nicely rendered backgrounds, though the foregrounds are low-resolution, both for the sake of framerate and likely processor power to keep the physics as accurate as possible. The sounds are simple but effective, audio cues indicating when you’ve done something special (as well as text), and clearing a board results in Ode To Joy playing just as ever. The game seems like random chaos at first, but after some practice, the patterns become more and more clear. Soon players will consistently get extra shots and long range hits that seemed impossible when they started.

The writing for the Adventure modes is highly amusing (even moreso for Peggle Nights, which is the sequel to the original and included in Dual Shot), there’s a massive amount of master challenges once Adventure mode is complete, quickplay options, and a duel mode played by passing the DS between two players (sadly no wireless option, but old-school hot seat certainly does the job). The game has an undeniable charm and ease to pick up, with an apparent simplicity that quickly gives way to real depth with practice and mastery. It’s a spectacular game on PC and Xbox Live Arcade, but DS might be the perfect platform for it. Peggle in your pocket, wherein you can go for a challenge wherever you are. On the bus, waiting in line, sitting in a theatre seat 50 minutes early so you don’t get stuck in the very front row for Watchmen, whenever, wherever.

Peggle:Dual Shot gets 5 out of 5. It’s too bad it doesn’t have wireless dueling, but it comes with tons of challenges, a good amount of exclusive levels, and both Peggle games on one cartridge. It’s a hell of a value, even if Marina, my favorite master and the addition to Nights, wasn’t included.