BADLAND: Game of the Year Edition Xbox One Review
BADLAND: Game of the Year Edition Xbox One
Publisher: Frogmind
Developer: Frogmind
Genre:
PEGI: E
Comments: (1)
BADLAND: Game of the Year Edition brings a mobile game to our living rooms with its latest release on Xbox One. If you have ever played the infamous Flappy Bird then you will already be familiar with the basis of BADLAND. It’s a side scrolling physics based game with obstacles in your way. Pressing the A button will bring your clone upwards and letting go will allow gravity to do its thing and bring your clone down to the bottom. In Flappy Bird, it’s just you, one bird, trying to avoid your surroundings as one hit of an object and your game is over. BADLAND is a lot more forgiving, allowing your clone to touch most of the objects without being hurt in any way, but speed is also a factor. Once you begin your journey you must avoid the screen movement which can kill off your clone if you fall behind. BADLAND is an eerie but beautiful piece of work that has more upside as a mobile game but the port over to Xbox One is still enjoyable.
As a clone in BADLAND you make your way through each level avoiding blades that slice, objects that crush and spikes that cause you to burst. The neat thing about your clone is once you touch other clones you multiply giving you a chance for additional survival in the end. If you lose a clone or two, or even 10 you will still be safe as long as you have one clone remaining to finish the level. The multiple clones make each level fun and hectic especially in a fast flowing level. Along with the obstacles and clones to multiply your fun, we also have items that if touched can alter your clone. There are items to increase and to decrease the size of your clones to burst through areas with your size and weight or to fit in a tiny space. There are also items used to stick to walls, slow down the speed of the clones and surroundings and even items to cause your clone to roll faster in clockwise and counterclockwise directions.
In terms of content, BADLAND has plenty of it. There are 100 total single player levels to progress through and each of the levels feature three optional goals to get through. You can complete the level without completing anything additional but the replay factor really comes in with the extra goals. There are goals to complete a level within a set number of tries and complete a level with a certain number of clones being saved. Each additional goal on top of beating the level itself gives the user many more hours of game play. In multiplayer mode you can have up to four players racing through twenty seven stages which can be very chaotic. In multiplayer you can win in multiple ways. The first way is by knocking or pulling your opponent off the screen which is a lot of fun in four player mode. You can also win by completing the race and then collecting bonus points for the clones you saved.
The visuals are stunning in BADLAND, with the crisp, high quality forefront right down to how your clone maneuvers through the levels. The majority of the colors in BADLAND are dark with blues, blacks and purples that combined with the shadowing of the backgrounds we get a great eerie look. The audio in the Frogmind title isn’t the greatest as most of what you hear is ambient noises and the clunks of your clone knocking into various items as you make your way to the end of a level. The absence of music is very confusing. Even a few tracks of audio throughout would be something to give us a complete package for this game.
BADLAND combines their fascinating visuals with the level designs to give us an entertaining puzzle game. With the navigational movements in the game, it might be a little difficult at first if you have little patience but give it a chance and things will progress. BADLAND: Game of the Year Edition provides hours of fun in single and multiplayer modes and it certainly gives a lot of content for the price of $11.99/£9.59. Enjoy it today by clicking here.