On Trial
Warp
On the surface, Warp is much like any other Xbox Live Arcade title. It’s a puzzler with a unique hook, that being that you solve the riddles and levels using the titular Warp mechanic. It also has a very cartoony look to it, exemplified mostly by the main character you play as and the colourful little grubs you collect which serve as in game currency. However, beneath that veneer of bright colours and beard-stroking gameplay lurks something much, much darker…
When I first saw Warp I pretty much nodded my head and thought to myself “Hmm, this looks interesting, I’ll give it a bash.” So, when it was released this week as the first in the annual Xbox Live Arcade House Party series, I promptly put it on my download queue. While waiting for it to finish, with a stupidly large Xbox Update in between (seriously, is it just for improving video? Is that it?) I decided to take in some screenshots and the achievement list, as is my tendency to do. I was took back by some of the achievements, primarily one named Corpse Killer, described as “seeing what these humans are made of”. Err… what about the cute little yellow chap with the big lovely eyes?
Turns out, Warp is a bloody gory game. Playing as yellowy/orange alien Zero, you start the game captured by scientists who are classified as EVIL due to the experiments they gleefully perform on you. No matter though, as after a pretty painless tutorial you have you powers back and are warping with the best of them. The warp mechanic is pretty simply done, a reticle appears in front of you showing where you can zip to, and in the early stages you pretty much use it to get room to room. Then, they introduce the notion of warping into objects, primarily barrels that are often left lying around in laboratories. Chuckles were had as I joyfully warped from barrel to barrel, avoiding deadly lasers and getting a feel for how the game will come about. Then, they introduced the Explode mechanic, where a toggle of the Left Stick will cause things to blow up. Then, they introduced humans and…
Oh. Dear. Unholy. Christ.
Yep. A key feature in Warp is “frags”. Frags which consist of warping into a human being, and then exploding them viciously with blood and gore and limbs flying upon the room. However you don’t need to stop there, why not just warp into a human, and get one of the security with big machine guns to notice this and warp out before the human is filled with delicious hot lead. Murdergeddon baby! Suddenly Zero isn’t so cute anymore…
Now, as a modern gamer I’m pretty desensitized to the bloody excesses of your average video game. Hell, I remember playing Mortal Kombat II as a plucky 11 year old and have grown up to be mostly murder free. However my first impressions of Warp did not even suspect that viscera would play such a strong part in proceedings, even though on closer inspect a lovely blood splatter appears on the box art… But focusing on the game itself, the warp gimmick is a pretty good one, and for the most part works well. The level design is straight forward enough to make going from A to B pretty basic, and even the “Boss Fight” that you face at the end of the demo, while benefiting from a trial and error learning curve, is pretty linear. Early puzzles have the base element of what a puzzle game is about down pat. You face a puzzle, learn from your mistakes, and carry on.
The other main aspect is the Challenge Mode, which sees you randomly find points where they are unlocked. Now, it may just be my sucky ability when it comes to puzzle games or challenges in general, but I found the times these were performed in quite, eye-opening. However some have done it quite easily so it most likely is just me. The challenges are fairly straight forward in the ones provided: warp and frag in a certain time limit. Simple stuff.
In the end, Warp is a nice little puzzler… well not nice. The horror aspect of exploding humans is quite… surprising, but strangely addictive. It’s not all frag frenzy though, as I am sure you can play the game more as a stealthy pacifist, but it appears to… reward the more sadistic. Graphically it’s solid, ditto musically, it all depends on how you feel about the core gameplay style of warping. I found it fun, but largely numbing for the long term. Again, maybe that’s because I’m not a puzzler person and prefer my splatter to be from the end of my gun… or spear…
VERDICT: Try
