Way back in 1976, Atari founder Nolan Bushell created a game called Breakout where players would use a paddle, a la pong, to bounce a ball and break several lines of multi coloured bricks. Though the game was simple in design, it was incredible addictive and shortly after its release many clones appeared on the market trying to capitalize on it's success.
Now, more then 30 years later, D3 Publisher of America has desided to bring back classic ball-breaking game play with Break 'Em All.
Keeping in line with other popular Breakout clones such as Tatio's Arkanoid, Break 'Em All features a number of useful power-ups to help the player accomplish his goal, however unlike many clones these power-ups are earned by breaking bricks and rallying, not by catching falling items.
In addition, players get to choose which power-ups are available from a series of options such as:
- Slow, or fast with a point boost
- Wide paddle, or or small paddle with a point boost
- Catch the ball, or mirror bounce
Having the option to choose power-ups allows players to craft the game experience around your own abilities, which makes the play experience more comfortable for novice players, while at the same time giving hardcore players the ability to knock up the difficulty.
Break 'Em All expands on the original Breakout style of gameplay by offering players several drastically different modes of play.
The first is "Tokoton Mode", which itself comes in two distinct flavours, Stanadard and Random. In standard mode player's simple bounce their way through 50 preset levels by breaking ever block on the screen, but in Random mode the level are generated on the fly offering players over 3,000,000 different combinations. It's simple classic arcade game play and it's just fun.
Next there's Quest Mode, which requires players to bounce the ball into an exit rather than destroying all bricks on the screen. Each mission in consists of three regular levels followed by a boss battle where players are required to hit a specific target a number of times in order to defeat their enemy.
Article comments
1 - Ken Edwards
This is one of those games that you just know is going to get passed on by the masses. For $20, its a great game. Other than that Survival Mode, of course. Break 'Em All is great as it is not just a clone of Breakout.