Rotastic is a puzzle game developed by Dancing Dots, and published by Focus Home Interactive. It available currently on Xbox Live Arcade, however there are planned releases for the PSN, and for PC.
The gameplay for this game is remarkable simple, with the whole game being based around the game mechanic, of swinging your character around a fixed peg on the screen, and moving from peg to peg to collect gems or perform stunts. There is a single player campaign in the game, that sees you playing across 7 different worlds, and having nearly 70 levels to play within the campaign.
The controls for rotastic, seem to me to be designed to allow anyone to just pick up and be able to play without having to go through a detailed and overly complicated tutorial or guide. The main control for the whole of this game, is using the A button on your controller. Pressing and holding A allows you to connect and swing around a fixed point, whilst releasing the A allows the pay to fly through the level to get to a new peg on the game. The right trigger button, changes the rotation of your character, which comes in handy in many of the levels on this game.
The main objective, as the game will tell you is ‘It’s simple, get everything!’ There are 6 different game play stages in Rotastic. The classic game play one is the gem collecting stage, where you have to coleect the required amount of gems as stated in the top right hand corner of the screen. The next stage is the survival stage. The player is pitted up against a monster or piece of machinery, as has to avoid it for a set amount of time to complete the level. The brickbreaker stage is ad it suggests on the tin, by swinging around the points; the player is to hit blocks to break them. The versus stage is one that can be split in to two, and is playable on the multiplayer part of this game. You are pitted against other AI character, in either a Deathmatch or a gem collecting race. The last two stages are puzzle, requires the player to complete a number of task to finish, and the acrobat level, where’s there’s no danger and tricks are required (and taught) in this stage.
The art style of Rotastic is very colourful and has a humourous style about it. Its great to look at, and adds an air of fun to an already enjoyable game. The characters in the game have been given loads of thought, and fits wonderfully within the style of the game. The user interface of the game has also been well planned, allowing the player to be able to see all the important aspects of the level with just a quick glance.
Presentation
The art style of the game fits beautiful with the humour of it, and it is great to look at. It appeals to the causal game market well as more established gamers. The audio of the game sits the backgrounf enough to be heard, but not irritating when you playing, and the narrative at the start of the levels is great.
Gameplay
The gameplay is easy, easy to play and easy to understand. This is a great example of a pick up and play game. All the different game stages keeps all the levels in each of the world’s fresh, and the difficulty curve is good, as its noticeable, but doesn’t shoot up too quickly.
Longevity
There are nearly 70 different levels based over 7 worlds, that provides hours of play, and the games ranking system for collecting different coloured helmets, ranging from copper to diamond based on your point score allows hours upon hours of replay time to this game. The multiplayer part that allows up tp 4 of your friends to play, adds additional gameplay to it. There are also 12 Xbox achievements that add up to 200g to be gained from this game.
Overall
This is a great little game to play on XBLA, and I thoroughly recommend getting this especially if you enjoy games like The Adventures of Shuggy or Peggle. It’s a great addition to anyone’s XLBA collection.
Disclaimer:All scores given within our reviews are based on the artist’s personal opinion; this should in no way impede your decision to purchase the game.
