Review: The Impossible Game
Score:
87%
You might think that The Impossible Game is yet another running and jumping game, where you have one control (in this case tapping on the screen) to make your character avoid the obstacles. On a superficial level you'd be right, but as the game speed increases there's simply not enough time for "an older reviewer" like me to react to the terrain and decide the correct course of action. But there's more to it than reaction time.
Version Reviewed: 1.00
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In actual fact, The Impossible Game is a rhythm game, where you are syncing up your actions to the driving bass line and tinkling notes of the in-game music. It's this fabric that gives you the clues as to the correct time to jump. It's not as simple as jumping on every beat, but if you can remember what's coming up next, then the music will guide you to the correct point to jump.
Well, I say jump... The Impossible Game is also a delight in minimalist graphics. Your central character is an orange square. The gaming world is a straight line, with only other squares hovering in the sky as platforms, squares punched out to create pits of death, and spikey triangles providing something other than a ninety degree angle in the world.
It's also not quite true to the name, because it's not impossible to play, its very smooth, easy on the eye, and accessible. It's just very, very (very) hard when you start a new section of each level. Regular readers will know how much I like games that are hard in the traditional sense of the computer games from the 80's.
There is a concession to those looking for an easier game experience (which drops it from "impossible" to "ridiculously hard"). At any point you can drop a flag into the game world, and when you die you'll start from the flag and not the beginning. Be warned though, this puts you into "practice" mode which means any results don't count in the game. To get the medals and open up some of the new levels, you need to complete the level in one run from the very beginning - others require a finish in practice mode, so keep your eyes on the requirements of the next level when you start a game.
And you will die. Lots. Any impact on any obstacle is instant death, except landing on top of a square, which lets you jump again to get more height and distance.
There's an 80's neon vibe going on with the graphics, and for the old school gamer in me this is very reminiscent of the vector based games, such as Asteroids and Battlezone, that inhabited the early gaming arcades. It's a great way to keep it looking rather minimalist while providing striking and clean images to play along with. There's also a huge amount of speed in the game, and this is all handled well, with the only "stutter" I've come across being when you restart a level and the music track loops back to the beginning. Thankfully, it's not every restart, but it does pop up enough to be noticed in a long playing session.
While I call it a long playing session, you can rattle through over 100 attempts at a level in about five to ten minutes, depending on just how long you can stay alive. What I love is that The Impossible Game adds in just enough muscle and music memory to take it away from being a pure "reactions" game, and that adds a lot of longevity to the title. It has thrived on other mobile platforms, and now it's here on Symbian (using the latest Qt technology).
Quite simply, I'm hooked.
-- Ewan Spence, May 2011.
Reviewed by Ewan Spence at