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 Blast
Works (Wii)
Blast Works is a fairly interesting
side-scrolling shooter that has some interesting play mechanics and a
winning, cute design. It allows you to collect enemies and add to your
firepower, which gives it a completely unique feel. Based on this alone,
the title would be worth buying, but its extensive level editing feature
adds plenty of replay value by allowing players to design, play and share
their own levels. This title represents is an impressive example of a
smartly implemented approach to user-generated content that makes this
largely unheralded Wii release worth picking up for gamers who want to do
more than just play the game. |
Loosely based and expanding on the flash
game Tukimi Fighters, Majesco's Blast Works offers an innovate take on the
traditional side-scrolling shooter genre. There are two basic modes of
play in the standard mode. In the Campaign mode, you can go as long as you
want with unlimited continues and can use this to unlock additional games
as well. Blast Works is fun enough as a single player game, but you can
play co-operatively with up to four players at the same time as well,
which makes for some frenetic shooting fun, that feels perfectly suited to
the Wii's casual style of play. Classic 2D shooter (or 'shmup') fans will
find plenty of innovative gameplay in this package, though there are some
familiar parameters at first glance. As you begin the game, things seem
somewhat usual, as you guide your ship through a series of levels,
shooting anything that gets in your way while avoiding swarms of enemies
and bullets. The extensive levels typically end with an elaborate boss
battle. This is where most of the similarities end. Instead of a
traditional power-up and shield system, Blast Works implements a unique
play mechanic that sets it apart from traditional shooters. When you shoot
an enemy ship or object, instead of merely disappearing, they spin around
and you can use your ship to catch them. Once they've been added to your
ship, they'll fire in the direction that they were caught, giving you more
bullets.
 One
of the key strategies in Blast Wind is to catch the opposing ships at the
right angle so that they're useful. You can very quickly create a very
large ship that can obliterate anything on the screen. This is also
important from a score point of view, since the more ships you have, the
larger each incremental score increase is. While your main ship is
somewhat small and weak, you can use the other collected objects as
shields to protect you from enemy fire. However, these ships are somewhat
easy to knock off of your collection, and if a bullet hits your smaller
main ships, the attached ones will all fall away. The basic mechanics and
maneuvers of the game are somewhat familiar, but this Katamari style of
building up your ship gives Blast Works a very unique and surprisingly
challenging feel. It's visual presentation is also very cool with a
minimalist, brightly colored approach to its design that uses stylish
wireframe models to give the entire game a trendy geometric feel. The
levels themselves look quite interesting as well, and there's a nice
variety of enemies and environments to look at. With five challenging
levels in all, most players should have plenty to do in the main game. Of
course, this design isn't just for aesthetics and it comes together nicely
with the other half of the package. Ironically, despite its many
innovations, Blast Works' controls are cumbersome when using the usual
wiimote and nunchuck configuration, but it plays much better with the
classic controller, which allows for more precise movement and more
traditional controls. This is to be expected given its traditional 2D play
fields, but still feels a little bit odd that more effort wasn't made to
take advantage of the wii-mote's unique abilities.
While the main game in Blast Works is
enjoyable and impressive in its own right, this is only half of what makes
this such an interesting title. Blast Works' most impressive feature
easily is the easy to use and surprisingly powerful editing tool included
in the package. This allows you to create your own unique levels and
designs and offers surprisingly flexible design choices, giving you plenty
of design breathing room. This is a great tool that lets you create your
own unique shooter and share it with other players via wi-fi connectivity.
Its menu is very easy to navigate using the wiimote as a pointer, and its
divided into several main sections covering basic shapes, ships, bullets,
background and behavior. These are represented as icons on the side of the
main window, which you can switch between. You have a basic selection of
shapes and objects to use as a default, and can also download additional
items online. Each of these can be edited and changed to your liking, and
you can scroll in and out on each object to give you the maximum amount of
detail.
 You
start by either creating your own or selecting one of the pre-made parts
that you can then use in your level. You can assign behavior to each
object and make it more or less aggressive. Then, you move onto each
element including designing the bullet motions and attack patterns, which
can be a task when you want to balance out each level, making it harder or
easier. After this has been set up, you can to place each object on the
level, adjusting their position for each stage. You can design the color
scheme and add decorative objects as well as other barriers such as
mountains or towers. You can zoom in and out and design each part of the
level and make something you like. After you're done creating your level,
you can tweak and test it out in the preview mode. Blast Works allows you
to save at any point in this process so your work won't get lost. As you
create each level, you can tweak and change any element you want as you go
along. While the process might seem daunting at first, you can use the
included user-created levels as templates to get started faster and give
you ideas. Once you have completed the level design process, you can then
save it and play it yourself from the main menu under the 'user levels'
heading, or trade it with other players via the online Blast Works Depot
site. This is a fun and simple editing process and it won't take a lot of
time to make a basic level, usually about half an hour or so, with more
elaborate levels taking longer. There's a lot of versatility in this
engine, and you can go a long way using the editing tool. While the
parameters are defined and somewhat constrained by the main game's
accumulation play mechanics, you can still create some fairly interesting
and unique levels without much effort. This feature definitely sets Blast
Works apart from other games on the market, and its fun without being
overly complicated or labor intensive.
This is an outstanding value proposition
between the innovative gameplay seen in the main game, which offers a
refreshing change of pace from the usual shooter mechanics, and the
powerful user editing tool, which gives players plenty of flexibility in
designing and editing their own levels. Blast Works offers a great amount
of compelling gaming in an accessible package, and goes several steps
further by allowing gamers to create their own levels in a way that's
powerful without becoming overcomplicated. This is probably one of the
best 'sleeper' titles on the Wii. It didn't get the attention of other
user-generated games like LittleBig Planet but, Blast Works is an
excellent example of how to integrate innovative gameplay and
user-generated content without compromising either area of the title.
-
Michael Palisano
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