Boom Blox
© 2008 Electronic Arts, Inc.
Note: See Boom Blox Bash Party (CTR, June 2009). See also FlingSmash. If you've ever tossed pebbles at a stack of cans, you can easily get to the core of Boom Blox -- a throwing/problem-solving game for one to four players that exploits the Wii's kinesthetic controls. The concept is easy to learn, and once you start, it is hard to stop. Your goal might be to inflict as much damage on a tower of blocks as possible, or perhaps to grab as many blocks as you can from a tower, without knocking it over. The better you get, the more challenges you can unlock, and your high scores can be saved on the Wii's hard disk. (EA is quick to remind you that the producer of this game was movie director Steven Spielberg, who was inspired by the Wii's controls.) However, before you break the shrink wrap on this game, you might want to actually follow those warnings that appear at the start of every Wii Game -- the ones that tell you to put on a wrist strap. That's because to play the game, you continually make sharp throwing motions at the screen; a motion that can easily send a controller flying. Get four kids doing this, and the breakage could become real. To make a throw, you first choose a target by positioning cross hairs onto a block. Then, while holding the A button, you make a throwing motion. The effect is amazingly like real throwing, partly because of the motion, and partly because of the tactile feedback as you release your throw. But the most exciting part of this game is the creative aspect, where you can build your own structures and knock them down. You can also populate your level with 30 characters, each preprogrammed to interact with others in a certain way. Because of the variety in building options, it is possible to make a pretty sophisticated chain reaction, which you can share online (a feature we did not try). You can play as a single player or against your friends with just one controller that you pass back and forth. So how could it be better? The menus are a bit clunky (not bad, but the pop-ups cover the choices when you roll over them), and despite the variety of the levels, all the throwing can get a bit tedious. We also didn't like the commercial implications of seeing EA's logo integrated into one of the puzzles. These points are more than compensated for by the rich creative possibilities, and the idea that you can have a virtual set of smart blocks that never need to be cleaned up or moved when you vacuum the rug. This can add months of playtime to the $50 investment. Another plus is the implied physics behind the graphics. It is very fun to toss rocks at a structure to see if it can take the punishment; and then watch it slowly start to sway as the foundation gives way. See the preview at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7zjWzpZN2Cg.
$50, Wii, Mobile Phones
Teaches: spatial relations, logic, gross motor development (throwing), creativity, programming
CTR Rating: 90%