 |
| OVERALL RATING |
3.5 |
| Presentation |
 |
4.0 |
| Control |
|
4.0 |
| Gameplay |
 |
3.5 |
| Fun factor |
|
4.0 |
| User Rating |
 |
5.0 |
 |
Posted: August 08, 2008
de Blob is a strange little action-puzzle game for both the iPhone and standard mobile phones that stars a little rolling blob of ink looking to bring color back to its black and white world. It’s not an entirely new concept (Mark Ecko’s Getting Up comes to mind), but it is quite refreshing in gameplay.
The action sees you rolling around the city coloring everything that you come in contact with and this includes buildings, trees, walls and citizens. Placed about the city are different colored dabs of paint and gathering them up not only determines the color that you’ll be painting with, but also increases the size of de Blob. This increase in girth allows you to paint certain buildings or overcome certain barriers but you can always slim back down and go back to no color by jumping into a pool of water.
But why would this be needed you ask? Because sometimes you’ll be too big for some passages and other times you’ll need to be the correct color to paint something. Speaking of which, there are a few main colors like blue, yellow and red but you’ll be able to mix them depending in the order they are picked up. For instance, grabbing blue then yellow results in green, or yellow and red results in orange. You get the idea.
Each level requires a certain point amount to be reached so that you can open the gate and get to the next level, and this must be accomplished before a timer runs out. The game is very casual though, to the point where you won’t really have to worry about the time, so you can roll around the city painting to your heart’s content. You can also select to roam around and find the hidden B-L-O-B letters for extra points.
About the only real danger you’ll encounter are the INKT agents that, if they touch you, will remove all color and cause you to remove the color of anything you touch until you take a bath in a pool once again. You can take these agents out however simply by jumping onto them, Mario-style, with the action button.
The mobile phone version uses the D-pad and center action button for controls while the iPhone version of the game uses touch-screen controls to direct movement of de Blob. For more fun however, you can select tilt controls and this will have you swaying your iPhone in different directions. People might wonder what the heck you’re doing, but they work perfectly and are a hoot.
de Blob is casually satisfying in many ways and offers cool little elements to keep you entertained. It’s entertaining in both versions, not surprisingly sharper looking on iPhone, but whatever version you do purchase will offer the same amount of fun.
