BattleBlock Theater
BattleBlock Theater Review
BattleBlock Theater’s wildly inventive stage design is undoubtedly its greatest draw. It offers up some of the most clever, satisfying, and varied 2D platforming in years. Eight worlds are loosely sorted into gameplay themes, each stage building and tweaking ideas established in the previous one. My favorite set of stages are all designed to force two runs – once with a (relatively) easier set of challenges, and then a second time after hitting a trigger to activate lasers, disappearing blocks, roving saw blades, or some other added bit of trickiness. No idea is used twice; if an idea does repeat it’s sufficiently escalated to really put your platforming skills to the test.
Stages alternate between pure Super Meat Boy-style skill and puzzle-platforming ala Braid or Toki Tori – sometimes within a few moments of each other. The variety is welcome and well-executed, and does a great job of propelling you from stage to stage. But the platforming feels better in other games, and the puzzling is lacking a hook like Braid’s time mechanics – it’s mostly pushing blocks.
Multiplayer modes allow as many as four people to participate at once either locally or online, but it’s also possible to interact with other players less directly. The game includes an intuitive level editor. A tutorial is included, but you’ll barely even need it if you’ve already played through the game. You select dimensions for your desired arena, then place blocks and objectives as you see fit. Once you create a “playlist” that contains three stages, you can upload your creation and other players may vote it up or down. Your creation could even be featured as a top-rated community selection if enough people like what you’ve done. Though there aren’t as many creation and sharing options as you’d find in something like Little Big Planet, the tools could keep you and others entertained for hours.
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