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"Cleaning up time in the Blinx of an eye"

In light of a market with a lack of innovative or original games, Artoon attempts to change that. Their idea is intriguing – giving the player a chance to play with time and the execution is almost perfect. It has too many scripted events and some flaws in its mechanics too make it great, but it's decent enough to keep you entertained for some time.

Story – 3/10

Blinx takes place so far in the future that one of the many, many worlds is named B1Q64 instead of a regular name. Also cats have evolved into smarter beings and speak a rather neat language. Blinx himself is a time sweeper, which, I believe, is a type of janitor who fixes mistakes in time with a sort of vacuum cleaner. A band of pigs called the Tom-Tom gang have begun wreaking havoc on the worlds by messing up time and kidnapping the princess of B1Q64. Even though the princess is human, and Blinx is a cat, he falls in love with her at first sight. This is the reason he runs towards the endangered world hub while the other cats run away from it. As charming and silly as this beginning cutscene is, Artoon doesn't spend any more time with the story until the final cutscene which comes after the boss is beaten. This really hurts the game because I think a great, fun story would have glazed over some of the game's faults, much like the story did for Conker's Bad Fur Day.

Gameplay – 8/10

Blinx is a fun game, no doubt. It has some gameplay flaws, plenty actually, but it's well designed and innovative. You'll notice the games flaws early on, but they won't come too much into play until about midway through the game. By this time, while you're enjoying the game, some frustration kicks in. Jumps are harder to judge because of the lazy camera (lazy as in it sits still unless you manually move it). The games auto aim function becomes less and less reliable, to the point where Blinx shoots at the ground or at walls. Only by jumping in the air do you prevent him from shooting at the ground, but sometimes it's an inconvenience to jump around everywhere to shoot enemies. Artoon also employs an annoying trick of hiding the number of enemies you're up against. Sometimes you walk into a room and see an enemy or two right away, but hiding behind those corners is another two or three, and that's a problem since Blinx can only take one hit. That's also a problem since you need to suck in trash for ammo, and if you're under prepared for a fight, you'll need to spend time while under attack sucking in trash. Still, I think the game is fun despite these flaws.

Artoon developed its levels so that gamers can beat them in less than ten minutes. In fact, you have only that much time to beat each level. I think Artoon did an excellent job with this, because it's probably harder to make levels that must be beaten in 8-9 minutes as opposed to levels that can take roughly ten minutes but without restrictions. On some of the levels I found myself scrambling in the last ten seconds to defeat the last bad buy and run to the goal, only to make it with less than a second left. Few games bother to create such suspense. This may create frustration for some gamers if they miss the goal time, but it's one of the rules of the game and it doesn't cheat you. In fact, it's possible to find each (three or four) cat head medal in each level and defeat each enemy and still make it to the goal in time. The testers did their work on this section of the game well – while for many other games I wonder why the testers don't speak up for some questionable design choices (Devil May Cry comes to mind).

Time powers are well implemented in the game, fortunately, as they're the game's selling point. In order to gain a time power you must collect at least three time crystals of one type. You can have only four time crystals at a time, so if you pick up three different crystals you just wasted them. The crystals don't disappear if left alone, which is a definite plus because otherwise the game would be impossible in some parts. Pause and slow are the most useful time powers because most of the games puzzles rely on them and they can also save you from death. Rewind and record are used only for puzzles, and fast forward is only used during the final boss fight in a way you might not guess. It's unfortunate that each power isn't used as much as another because you might find yourself short a rewind due to lack of necessity. The final boss, since I mentioned it, is quite an achievement. It's creative, challenging, and fun. I rank this boss among some of the other memorable platform game bosses along with Bowser from Mario 64. The other bosses in Blinx are well done as well, but not quite as memorable as the final boss.

Visuals – 8/10

Some have complained that Blinx's visuals are too simplistic, but they fail to realize that simplicity doesn't mean lower quality. Not all games need to have busy backgrounds or dazzling effects to impress. It's a nice game to look at. Blinx animates well, he looks furry, and his gold shoes reflect the world around him. The environments look good. The enemies are cartoony, colorful, and, well, simple. Like I said, simplicity isn't bad. Some of the enemies look like candies and some even animate like candies would if they bounced around. Later on some enemies become more visually impressive and the bosses are fun to look at. But, really, it's only important that they're fun to look at. It doesn't matter whether they dazzle you with effects and complex animations and details.

Sound – 6/10

The only real sound in this game is the music. Enemies don't make a sound (which may explain why two or three of them can hide from you so easily) and Blinx makes hardly any sounds. The music is decent at best, but has nothing memorable in its soundtrack. Any other sound, like using time powers, is generic.

Longevity – 7/10

This game has a decent life span for those willing to play through it and an even longer one for those who want to collect each of the cat head medals. However, I'm afraid that many gamers will be too frustrated to get to the last boss, which is really a great fight. There's no reason to play through the game again, but the levels can be fun to play through a couple of times. There also isn't much of a reward in collecting the cat head medals except for some silly cutscenes and neat concept art. For some replay value, Artoon put in some rather expensive items in the game's shops. In order to gain money you play through levels. The only problem is that the items cost a fortune and it would take hours to collect enough money. Frankly, it's not worth a few hours of play to wear a new leopard or desert outfit.

Well, since the game was somewhat popular, it is now a Platinum Hit and can be had for 20 dollars. I might be hesitant to recommend it at $50, but at $20 I say go for it. You might find yourself having a good time.

Score – 7/10


Reviewer's Score: 7/10, Originally Posted: 09/26/04