Sometimes all a gamer wants is a truly new experience. There are a multitude of shoot ‘em up games, ‘hijack a car’ games, and hack-and-slash games. They may all have different storylines and time periods, but they are all essentially the same. Games that actually provide an original thought, challenge, or game play method are few and far between these days (which, coincidentally, also plagues the movie industry it seems). Therefore, when something is released that makes someone stop and think “Hmm, that’s interesting”, it is worthy of attention. Like Katamari Damacy before it, Bit.Trip.Complete is one of the more recent games to do that.
The Complete aspect of the game’s title refers to the six bit-related games that Aksys Games and Gaijin Games have released since 2009. As the title also mentions, these games are completely designed in an old school, Atari-like bit design. The prime characters, objects, and font used in each game generally comprise of giant squares, which certainly wins a few nostalgia points from gamers who grew up listening to Duran Duran and Flock of Seagulls. Unlike those games of old, Bit.Trip.Complete is saturated with an absolutely killer electronic soundtrack and advanced visuals. This, as well as the unique overall game design, is what will draw people in regardless of age.
As mentioned before, Bit.Trip.Complete contains six games of varying game play interaction and difficulty. Beat, the first of the Bit series, is an advanced working of Pong. While holding the Wii remote horizontally, one tries to bounce square bits off of the rectangular paddle on one end of the screen. As each bit is bounced, a tone occurs that perfectly fits in with the background electronic music. The more bits that one connects with the more the soundtrack improves and flows.
The challenge is, of course, to actually meet those bits when they arrive near the paddle. As levels progress, it is quickly apparent that these bits are not just going to lazily float across the screen so that it is a simple venture of moving the paddle up and down at leisure. These bits will do crazy things, like swirling towards the paddle or bouncing off of it only to boomerang back. The most frustrating ones are the ‘change up’ bits, where they slowly arrive on the screen, stop, and then proceed like a fastball towards your paddle. Needless to say, it will take the user a couple of times to not only connect with all of the bits but also make their game soundtrack sound the most complete.
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