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Blinx: The Timesweeper
by Hector Cortez
Thursday, August 22 2002
The Xbox, long without a good platformer has no further to look.
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Title:
Blinx: The Timesweeper
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Platform:
Xbox
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Publisher:
Microsoft |
Developer:
Artoon |
#
of Players: 1 |
Genre:
Action/Platformer
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Origin:
United States
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Expected
Release:
Fall 2002 |
Grapevine:
While everyone is busy living in the old 3-D world, Blinx has the power to control time, which is the 4th dimension (go read The Time Machine). |
Ah, yes... Blinx. The cat with a vacuum for a weapon, we all remember him from E3 and the big splash he made there. But does this cat live up to his 9 lives and deliver a great gaming experience or simply another platform game to add to the pile? Read on and find out.
The storyline in Blinx is this: Blinx is a janitor equipped with his trusty Timesweeper, a tricked out vacumm cleaner. One day while working to rid the land of time monsters the Tom-Tom Gang crashes the party and steals time crystals and kidnap an innocent princess (wait, does that whole princess thing sound familiar). They head for world B1Q64 followed closely by the fearless Blinx to destroy all the time monsters that plagues the land and save the Princess.
A cool concept that Blinx's marketing people are pushing is the '4-D' concept. While everyone is busy living in the old 3-D world, Blinx has the power to control time, which is the 4th dimension (go read The Time Machine). Blinx can pause, rewind, fast forward, and record, and slo time by collecting certain crystals throughout each level. It's just like a VCR.. minus the whole crystal thing.
Blinx: The Timesweeper has 10 levels, each broken up into 3 different parts and a boss fight at the end. You have to pass each of them in order to advance to the next one. To pass these levels, you'll have to defeat the time monsters using your Timesweeper and things that you sucked up such as trach cans or a plant. When you attack, one of the items that you sucked up earlier will launch toward the enemy and it will either kill it or wound it depending on the item or the enemy.
That is basically the whole concept of Blinx. Save the princess will going through 10 levels while messing around with time to aid your on your quest. Simple storyline but gets the job done.
A couple of problems in Blinx are the camera and Blinx's speed. The camera isn't alwasy that cooperative. Sometimes it will go to the weirdest spot so you will have to be asjusting it yourself with the right stick. As for Blinx's speed, you would think he was faster but he's not. That is a big thing in platform games, speed. Speed = fun and Blinx suffers from lack of it. Make Blinx faster for the sequel please.
Visually, Blinx: The Timesweeper is a work of art. Blinx's visuals can be classified in the same category as Dead or Alive 3... beautiful. Each world is highly detailed and unqiue, each with a great deal of polish.
Blinx is done well also. Blinx animates grealty with fluid movement. Microsoft wanted to create a unique mascot for the game and it did a great job although Blinx seems to smile to much... perhaps vacuums make him happy. Anyways, thats a whole different story, and site, for that matter.
Overall, in the graphics department, ARTOON did a tremendous job. Oh yeah, one little thing, the game tends to slow down when later on into the game when you are surrounded by 6 or more bad guys. Aside from that, the visuals don't dissapoint.
Now onto the sound. Nothing special here. The music does change for every level which is a plus but it's that videogame music that we all hate or love, there is no maybe. In this case, it could have used some work as none of the tunes stuck in my head unlike those classic tunes from Super Mario Bros. on the NES... who could forget the level one song. As for sound effects, there aren't many in the game but when there is something to be heard, it is done well. I did like the fact that Blinx and his 'people' speak a different language, not English. It helps give it that fantasy spirit to it. Nothing special but it gets the job done.
Overall, Blinx is a game that should be checked out for its 4-D technology and use of the hard drive. While some may become frustrated by the difficulty later on in the game, others will see it as a challenge and wan't more. Great visuals, average sound and good gameplay make Blinx: The Timesweeper the best platformer on Xbox... for now.
--- Hector Cortez
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