Leger vs. Bit.Trip Core (Wii)

Probably too close to release when opinions on Bit.Trip Beat started to appear, considering how things really took a turn towards something way less devilish to master by the time the third game in the series arrived.

Bit.Trip Core, the second game in the series, thus keeps most of the truly annoying aspects of Beat, where the three songs to deal with lacks any checkpoints while reaching some fifteen minutes in lenght.

Still, where the controls of Beat dealt with the tilting of the wiimote in an analogue sense it is easier in Core to push one of four directions on the d-pad (to active a laser kind of thing) and combine that with a push on a button (to shoot).

(Let us not go into the part of everything dealing with our hero Commander Video having been born and now learning how the world works, in a semi metaphorical way with the gameplay while being quite straight about it all in the cutscenes.)

While conceptually a homage to an old Atari 2600 game called Cosmic Arc Bit.Trip Core still deals with huge pixels (called beats) moving in sync with the music just like its predecessor Beat.

Some move in a straight line, some rotate around the core, some seem to be inspired by sinus waves and all of them no matter how they move should be eliminated to avoid making a nose dive into the Nether where the black and white origins of gaming resides and a Game Over is close at hand.

If doing well things go Mega and later Super with some added acid making the visuals and music pop while still keeping in line with the retro aesthetics.

Even though simple to learn, to actually master the gameplay is hard as hell.

Beats sometimes seem to move all over the screen in not so obvious patterns, and with some misses here and there it can be hard to get back on track and know where to aim and when to shoot.

Especially if some of the special beats are missed, making one miss out on, for example, lasers pointing in two directions at once.

In a matter of seconds 10+ minutes of progress can be lost.

Fuck you very much.

The digital controls thankfully makes it a bit easier than in Beat to focus on memorizing the songs, the patterns of the beats, and make some progress with each play.

But, still.

Core is in no way an easy game, rather frustratingly hard, and with only three songs and pure trial and error throughout you would do well with having no problems whatsoever with playing the same minutes of the game over and over and over and over and over again.

I do feel motivated, though, to actually stick with it until the end just because it is a tad fairer than Beat; There is no multiplayer shit making things easier and a smart bomb can be aquired and activated to clear the screen of beats if things get too chaotic.

Some small steps towards a more welcoming attitude, sure, but Gaijin Games still had a ways to go to reach what Void would offer next.