Review: Bit.Trip Beat

Bit.Trip Beat carries a lot of "firsts". It was the first game in the now six game Bit.Trip Series; it was one of the first games worth buying on the WiiWare platform; and it is inspired by the first mainstream video game ever - Pong. But should it be first on your list of games to buy?

Gameplay

Bit.Trip Beat relies very heavily on the Pong model. You control a rectangular paddle on the left side of the screen. But instead of facing off against another paddle, you are tasked with returning multiple "beats" (Bit.Trip's version of the ball in Pong).  The beats come at you at various speeds, angles and sizes. Some travel in a straight path, while others move in a sin wave, while still others bounce off your paddle and return back in an arc. The hook here is that each beat creates a note when struck. So the beats come in on a beat and add to the background music - making you an active participant in creating the game's music.

Sin Wave Formation

Controlling the game is simple, yet its something that cannot be done effectively with a traditional controller. This game was first released on the Wii as a downloadable title, tasking players with holding the remote sideways and rotating it toward and away from the player. This essentially recreated the analog control of the old Atari paddle - or "wheel" controller. The game is also available for iOS devices (iPad, iPhone etc) and Mac and PC, using the touch screen and trackpad or mouse for control, respectively. All the control methods work well, and all have their own issues.

Playing on the Wii would sometimes give you the "jerky" movement players sometimes experience with the Wii Remote. Playing on an iOS device gives you more prescise control, but suffers from your giant mitts blocking the screen. You can slide your finger anywhere on the device, but no matter where you do it, you're blocking your view of something. I haven't played on the PC or Mac but can imagine that using a mouse is precise as well, but you are limited by your mousepad or physical space to move your mouse around in. Between the iPad and Wii versions, I felt more comfortable using the iPad, even with the blocking of the screen.

To explain the rest of the gameplay, I really need the help of a video.

This is the first level of the game. As you can see, the paddle on the left is returning the beats coming in from the right. You'll notice two bars on the screen - the one at the top labeled "MEGA" and the one on the bottom labeled "NETHER". As the player returns the beats, the MEGA bar begins to fill. Once its filled you go into MEGA MODE. Here, the music becomes fuller, the graphics become more intense, and you have an opportunity for point multipliers.

The NETHER bar is filled by missing beats. Miss enough and you'll drop into the Nether world. Here you are depleted of any and all sound effects and music, and the game becomes a black and white Pong game. If you fill the NETHER bar while you're in the Nether world, its game over.

None of this is really explained to you and you are basically left to figure it out on your own. These extra mechanics didn't come to me immediately, but it was kinda fun to figure it out along the way "Oh, that does that! OK!"

Presentation

For a game that does everything to convince you of it's retro-ocity, the presentation is where that would be achieved. Bit.Trip Beat features blocky, Atari-style graphics and music, but with a sprinkling of the modern. Things move much more quickly than they ever could on a 2600, the colors and seizure-inducing patterned lightshows are definitely a mark of it's current-gen nature, The only thing that detracts, visually, is the fact that the background animations often cloud your vision, making the beats difficult to see. These instances are certainly more prevalent in the later levels, but its certainly a notable frustration.

The music is from the same ilk. It's as if someone took a soundtrack from the Atari era and remixed it with beaty beats and flippity flups. The real treat is getting into MEGA mode and hearing the music as it is intended to be heard. My initial reaction to that design mechanic was "but I'm missing out on all the good music!" to which I replied to myself "maybe if you were better at the game, you'd hear it more, stupid!"

Stuff I Loved: 

• Retro-Modern graphics and music
• Classic Gameplay
• A serious challenge at points

Stuff I Hated

• A little short (probably spent five or so hours with this overall) 
• Distracting background graphics 
• Various control issues across all platforms  

All in all, I would recommend you check this out in one form or another. I think your best value is on the iOS App Store at just a buck. It's $6 on the Wii and I think $10 on Steam for Mac and PC. Either way, you should own some sort of device to play it on, and I would recommend you shove this game into that device's hard drive.

Blam. 

Review In Ten Words or Less: 
A "TRIP" down retro lane that fully satisfies.