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"It's Cat vs. Dog - er.. I mean Pig - in this innovative and pleasurable sequel."

Blinx: The Time Sweeper! Remember him? No? Hmm, didn't think so. As a handful of you may know, though, the first Blinx, by Artoon, was a very nice little game, with "Xbox Mascot" potential. Unfortunately, many gameplay flaws and poor advertising resulted in a low fanbase. But thankfully, Artoon decided to give those cute little feline time heroes another try.

And by golly, with Blinx 2, Artoon fixes every single problem, including Time Crystal collecting, time limits, and crazy level/boss difficulty. Additionally, Blinx 2 adds so much more fun stuff to improve even more from its predecessor. Of course, there are some flaws in this game, but they are almost completely outweighed by all the goodies that Artoon gives you.

As with many other platform games, Blinx 2 offers a somewhat elementary story. Fortunately, the story doesn't revolve around Blinx mindlessly chasing some princess around any more. Actually, the pig does that in this game... You see, the Tom-Tom Gang (the pigs) attempted to steal the Biiiig Crystal, but instead caused it to break into eight pieces. Then this weird girl, Mina, appears in Benito's (the Tom-Tom ruler) dreams, and tells him to go find the crystal fragments. Additionally, the Time Sweepers' Factory has experienced huge problems as a result of the Tom-Toms' foolishness, with weird Tom-Tom lookalikes invading and destroying their factory. Therefore, they also have to look for the crystal fragments, to get rid of their problems. Final Fantasy, anyone? Yes, so the story thing isn't all that original, but it's a light-hearted platform game! We need to focus on the gameplay, people! And that's why this game is so awesome!
--Story: 6.5/10

Gameplay! That's what this game is all about! And boy, does it deliver. First off, the player will get to enjoy two different types of gameplay, the Time Sweepers and the Tom-Toms. The Time Sweepers are going to be familiar to the players of the first Blinx. Your cat uses a shiny vacuum to suck up trash/money/time crystals, and uses them to advance in the game. But the vacuum can also be used for things such as hanging onto ropes or getting flung off of weird cylinder-thingies. Most of the time, though, is spent sucking up trash and shooting it out at monsters. One thing I didn't like about this was that every normal enemy took only one hit to dispose of, whether it's a big dragon, or a cute little spike-monster. Then of course there are the time crystals. All of the time crystals from the first are reused in this one. Of course, Artoon made much better use of them in this game--Fast Forwards are used to run through bonus-rings, for example. You can even combine two time crystals to manipulate time to solve the more difficult puzzles, which is a really cool advancement from the first.

Playing as the Tom-Toms is meant to be like playing a combination between a platformer and Splinter Cell. The Tom-Toms' get to use various weapons to dispose of those goody-two-shoes Time Sweepers, and in addition get some special items to aid them. The weapons are mostly guns, used to shoot enemies (duh), and the only difference between most of the guns is strength, but they're still fun to use. The items are fun, too. The pigs are space-manipulators, so they use items like bubbles traps or black holes to advance. There are many other cool and innovative items, but there are also some useless ones, like bananas, which you need to VERY carefully place in a cat's path to make him… trip. Yeah, the only time you will use a banana is in the “Banana Tutorial” part of the game. But forget that, there's more! The pigs can also use tanks, turrets, melee weapons, and snipers to defeat their foes. The only thing I'm really not impressed about the pig half of the game is that playing stealthily is kind of silly unless you really aren't in good shape health-wise, and want to avoid getting in a fight. Most of the time I just blasted right through everyone, but I still had a very fun time with the Tom-Toms.

Some of the most fun players will get is out of the boss fights. These do not involve just plain shooting at big monsters. They require well thought-out strategies, whether it's stepping inside a shadow, or having every single part of the boss's body be targeted by your team at once. The boss fights in this game are some of the most fun boss fights I've ever played.

Something I think everyone will like about Blinx 2 is that you get to customize your own cat and pig to your liking. Every little detail, from whisper length, to height, to flag-color, is customized originally by YOU. It's really fun, and you can do it whenever you want, so if you get sick of your cat's/pig's look, just change it. You can change clothes too, if you have the money to buy extra clothes, that is.

Also, if you want a break from the main quest, you can go to a shop and do some mini-games, like shooting targets with a turret as a Tom-Tom. You get rewards, of course, such as medals or new teammates. All of the games are surprisingly fun, especially since you have that anticipation of getting a fun reward if you complete it. There's also a theater where you can watch movies from the game if you want.

With all this gameplay goodness, you're probably thinking, “well it can't be PERFECT, can it?” Well, no, it can't. And it's not. One example of this game's imperfectness is the Dry Cleaners. Your character gets dirty after awhile, so you have to take him to the dry cleaner and get his clothes nice and clean. Kind of stupid, if you ask me, and it costs money. Also, if you're a girl, I'm sorry, but there are no female cats/pigs to play as in this game. Even stranger, all the cats have weird realistic human voices. They sound like superheroes or something, but they're cute little cats! What happened to the old Time Sweeper language that Blinx spoke in the first game? And speaking of Blinx, I'm sorry to say that he only appears a handful of times throughout this game, and is not a playable character.

But those are just the little tiny problems. The biggest problem in this game is the operators that instruct you throughout each and every level, whether you're a cat or pig. Even if you know exactly what to do, the operator tells you what to do. Even if you're replaying a level, the operator tells you what to do. Even if you die right after you complete a puzzle, the operator will tell you what to do again once you reach it again. It's silly, frustrating, and sometimes even interrupting towards gameplay. In all its frustration, though, you can always just skip through all the text quickly. Still, let me just play the game! In general though, it really isn't that bad unless you're very impatient.
--Gameplay: 9.5/10

Now for the graphics. I really liked the graphics in this game. They're not much different from the first, but that's still a good thing. Every little whisker on the cats is noticeable and carefully placed. Shiny objects glisten more as they enter lighter areas. Shiny floors show dull reflections of the characters, hard floors show nice shadows. There are even some nice little particle effects here and there. Something I really liked about this game is that there is no slowdown whatsoever, even when there's a lot of action going on onscreen. The environments are nice, but nothing extraordinary. The graphics with this game wouldn't suit any other system better than the Xbox.
--Graphics: 8/10

The music for Blinx 2 is sort of like the first. Fun and catchy 80's-esque tunes are in each of the levels. They're nothing that will win Grammys, but they're appropriate. The one thing I didn't like was how the Tom-Tom levels had the same type of catchy music as the Time Sweepers. If you're trying to be stealthy, then upbeat, happy music doesn't help set the mood at all, and I think this is one of the reasons the whole “stealth” idea for the Tom-Toms doesn't work.
--Music: 8/10

The sounds in Blinx 2 are also good. They're not realistic; they're more cartoony and goofy, which is kind of necessary for this lighthearted type of game. When a monster dies, a weird twirly sound occurs. When a Tom-Tom hits an enemy with a gun, a little whistle sound is made. The VCR-ish sounds made when a Time Crystal is used are very cool, too. Unfortunately, as I said before, the voices in this game are ridiculous. I really hope that Artoon was trying to make it a funny irony with the superhero-voices of the cats. I really do miss that cute little language that was spoken in the first, as opposed to English like in Blinx 2. The Tom-Toms' voices are in English as well, but I honestly didn't mind theirs. The rough voices fitted appropriately to the pigs' attitudes. When all is said and done, though, the sounds in Blinx 2 really aren't too shabby.
--Sound: 7.5/10

Difficulty in Blinx 2 is much more reasonable than in its predecessor. There is no ludicrous ten-minute time limit, which caused many game overs in the first Blinx. Of course, that's not saying this game is easy. Artoon did an excellent job of making this game not too hard, but not too painless.
--Difficulty: 10/10

Artoon took an extra step with Blinx 2 and added a multiplayer mode. It seems that the multiplayer is pretty much the same as single-player, except more people play… Also, many players will be disappointed that there is no Xbox Live to be played with this game. Additionally, good luck finding someone who will actually want to play multiplayer with you in a game starring cats and pigs. Now don't sound surprised when I say this, but it doesn't seem like this game is quite as popular as Halo.
--Multiplayer: 6.5/10

So, after Blinx 2 is beaten, will you want to play again? I think you would, actually. There are many extra things to do, such as collect medals, play mini-games, buy junk, and just have more fun with replaying levels. Even if it doesn't get a full replay-through, gamers will most likely come back to this game now and then to have some Time and Space action.
--Replay Value: 8.5/10

All in all, I really don't understand what the deal is with all the mediocre reviews this game has been getting. I've played tons and tons and tons of games in my lifetime, so I can tell you that I've been there and done that. I'm happy to be one of the few people who took the time (and space… little joke there) to pick up Blinx 2, and I'm sure that if you have a couple of extra bucks handy and buy this (inexpensive) gem, you will be happy too.
--OVERALL: 9/10


Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 07/27/05