A Boy and His (Explosive) Blox

by Mike Martin



Whatever people expected when Electronic Arts announced a three-game development deal with Steven Spielberg, it probably wasn’t this.


There’s an unparalleled aura surrounding The Beard: Say his name and just TRY not to hum the Indiana Jones theme.  But this first of his electronic offerings is not some heartwarming extra-terrestrial fantasy, some globe-scouring adventure: “Boom Blox” is a plotless game about blocks that teeter and totter and blow up good; “Boom Blox” is Jenga with glycerin.


Which might make you worry, if you played Wii’s apocalyptic “Jenga” earlier this year.


But there’s no real cause to fret here: This is not one of those depressing Wii shovelware titles where the developers merely recreate digitally what one should just do in real life (I’m looking at you, “Playground”). Rather, it’s a genuine puzzle game. Make a throwing-motion, ala “Wii Sports,” at the stacks of blox on your television, and on-screen you’re tossing a weapon (bowling ball, explosive ball, etc.) at the blox-tower, in an attempt to destroy it. Cause certain types of blox to touch and you trigger an extraordinary detonation that’ll take down an entire pillar in one fell ka-boom.  


As far as core game mechanics go, that’s all there is to “Boom Blox.”  


But it is — ahem — explosively fun.


The physics here, considering Wii’s relatively weak processors, are impressive, and slowdown is a surprisingly small issue. Of course, that comes at a cost: The graphics, not dissimilar in style to the “MonkeyBall” franchise, are overly simplistic, and the polygon counts strictly GameCube-era.  


The single player mode can grow repetitive, but — despite the lame “LightGun” levels — it is still by and large enjoyable.  


The multiplayer setup, though, is where the game really shines.


As a casual party game, this bests “Wii Sports,” and with a little tweaking might have even conquered the eternally entertaining “Bomberman.” This game shares the old mathematical formula for party games: The more people around the television, the funner it becomes. Until I had an audience of eight, I never realized I could get so nervous aiming my shot at the blox, or so furious if my buddy “accidentally” bumped my elbow while I was trying to remove a single piece from my tower.  


Another nice addition to “Boom Blox” is the level editor. It’s accessible and incredibly intuitive, and there’s a real “Mousetrap”-ian pleasure to setting up Rube Goldberg toys and making them detonate. EA seems to realize, too, that designing levels oneself can become tedious: Like “Super Smash Bros.,” you can also download other people’s designs via WiiConnect.  


This thoughtfulness, however, if offset by a total lack of online multiplayer: a large and unforgivable strike for this type of game.


But despite the nitpicks, there’s something genuinely charming about “Boom Blox” I simply can’t get past. I remember, after playing “Portal” for the Xbox 360, that I’d spend time — sometimes up to an hour — simply sitting down and staring around and wondering just how I would use the Portal Gun on, say, my daschund. I passed a construction site earlier this morning, and found myself considering what the best place to toss a bowling ball would be, and how many points I’d get for style.  


This game has me hooked — and it didn’t even need an E.T. or an archaeologist to do it.  


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Contact Mike at MMartin       @graffitiwv.com