Ricochet: Lost Worlds Review

Hello again, I know I have been posting a lot recently, but that is a good thing, isn't it?

I want to do a short review of the new-ish breakout game Rocochet: Lost Worlds. I only have played through the demo, but it gave me a pretty good idea of how the whole game is, and I have played through the entire previous game in the series as well.

Reflexive Entertainment is very good at dreaming up new ideas for this game. The Ricochet games I would say are probably my favorite breakout titles, and I have played a lot of breakout games, surprisingly enough. This one, being a sequel, has to include entirely new ideas or else it would become just a hogepoge of the same old stuff. This game, however, really lays out the ideas left and right and when coupled with the new and interesting level design, a good game make it does. I do not know how they do it, but they included all of the best powerups from the first game and added more of them, and every time I see a new powerup or brick it is always a new and interesting idea that mixes the gameplay up a bit. For example, one of the new powerups is the laser ball. When picked up, the ball becomes purple and randomly fires lasers all over the place. One of the new bricks, well, every environment includes new brick art and physics, but one of the new brick types is the magnet brick. These are first seen in the space/alien environment shown above. When two magnets of the same color are activated at the same time, the blocks attract each other, sliding across the screen to meet each other in a small explosion, destroying other bricks along the way. If two magnets of different colors are both activated, they repel each other, blowing up individually on each side of the screen, destroying anything in their path of course. It's ideas like these that make the game constantly new and entertaining. It still can get old after a while of playing, especially after you go through all of the environments once, but for the most part it is a good time.

One more thing: The level design in this game is just fantastic. All the bricks are moving all the time, some more than others. The backgrounds are all animated. The positioning and tracking of the bricks is very well done, and makes each level feel almost completely different. Without such great level designers, this game would fall flat on its face.