Review

At first glance you might see Boom Blox, and Steven Spielberg’s name plastered on the front, and stand there scratching your head. He might be a mighty fine director of movies, but what exactly does the bearded one know about videogames? He has, however, had a long connection with the medium. Cast your mind back to the LucasArts’ adventure, The Dig, which was based on a Spielberg story, and then there’s his involvement with the first Medal Of Honor, produced by DreamWorks Interactive no less.

The legend has it that Spielberg saw the Wii, loved it and decided he wanted to create a new game that he could play with his kids. E.A. have certainly delivered, this is a game that could happily sit alongside Wii Sports on the shelf as a harmless slice of family fun - although we could have done without all the rectangular animals with silly names, but more on that later.

The basics of Boom Blox are that you use your remote to throw balls at stacks of blocks to knock them down. You must first aim your on-screen target and hold down the A button to lock-on. Then you swing the remote and let go of A at the end to launch the ball. You can also hold down the B button to rotate the view to line up your best shot. It’s pretty responsive and recognises your movements well, only occasionally misreading your power.

In addition to wanton destruction, there are a number of challenges that require a little more finesse and, most importantly, thought behind your throws. Score challenges require you to only hit the gold blocks to score, with black ones cancelling out your efforts. Explosive blocks, unstable blocks and indestructible blocks complicate matters further and help to keep things interesting.

Then there are the challenges that allow you to use your skills to attack the animals! These annoying animals look like dominos, have stupid names and are an absolute pleasure to hit, whether it’s by accidentally hitting one in the background or hurling a bomb into a large group of them. When playing story mode you’ll get occasional cut-scenes telling you various tales of what these creatures are up to, which fortunately can be skipped. While these creatures will undoubtedly appeal to small children, they are more likely to alienate the very gamers who will enjoy the game the most. By putting them on the box, this has more chance of being left on the shelf than it deserves.

Boom Blox is precisely the type of game the Wii needs more of – simple, addictive gameplay, brilliant controls and decent multiplayer options. What it also has is bags of charm and enough variety to prevent you getting bored. Even then, there’s an easy to use level creator where you designs can be shared with friends across the internet. Maybe Spielberg was onto something after all?

About the Review

Platform

Nintendo Wii

Developer

E.A. Los Angeles

Publisher

Electronic Arts

Released

9th May 2008