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Review: Sound Shapes Innovation. Smart developers seek it out in the hopes of capturing lightning in a bottle: that one grasp at a title that will delight and entertain the masses with its unique, fun take on a familiar theme, heightened through innovation. Sound Shapes treads familiar ground, but combines ideas in a seemingly innovative way to evoke a new love for something we may have seen before. Problem is, it doesn't always work out that way.
Sound Shapes (PlayStation Network, PlayStation Vita [reviewed]) At its simplest, Sound Shapes is a platformer, where gathering coins add notes to an overall musical score that permeates the level. Each piece you collect builds the musical composition, and environmental objects bop and wiggle to the beat to further fuel the cacophony of rhythm. You maneuver a small blob through 20 levels, each based on a musical composition by artists like Beck and deadmau5, with accompanying artwork by PixelJam, Superbrothers and others that compliments the tunes and fits the style of the musician and their compositions. There are five "albums" which all have distinct graphic styles and contain between three to five songs each. The platforming is fairly basic. You roll your little blob around, jump with X, and you can boost with square or the right shoulder button. However, when boosting, this also drops your weird little blob aura, which lets you to stick to certain things. This allows for a certain strategy in maneuvering through the levels, but nothing too brain bending. There's really only one hazard in the game: the color red. Anything red, once you touch it, kills you. However, the game is fairly forgiving, with multiple respawn points in each level. It's like a simplistic form of LocoRoco, just with building music as the main level goal. Levels aren't particularly difficult, but some designs are truly inspired, while others are sadly quite flat. The Beck levels in particular are some of the most amazing and engaging levels I've ever had the pleasure of scooting a little blob thing along to. There are sections of his songs that have minimal lyrics, and in certain settings, these lyrics come alive as platforms that spawn, swivel, and die out until the chorus repeats again. It's a neat bit that I wish was repeated more in the other levels.
As you capture each note coin and build up the music, you're also collecting the environments and beats to be used in the level editor. While it's no LittleBigPlanet, there's a certain satisfaction to creating a sequence of music that builds as your gather items. There's already a nice little community effort, and some familiar non-Sony tunes have made their way into the stages that can be downloaded. Again, there's not a whole lot of innovation going, but there certainly is the potential for it. Sad thing is, I think that's one of the problems with this title. Sound Shapes doesn't quite reach its potential. There are some truly great level designs here (some with the occasional ship to pilot, avoiding hazards in space or water) but there's not enough of them, and before you know it, you've finished the main campaign. In fact, the majority of the level designs are more of a chore to grind through than the occasional visual and auditory delights. There are only three Beck levels, and of those, truly only two are worth playing, as they're the best levels in the game. Granted, after beating the main campaign, two new modes open up: Beat School and Death Mode. Beat School plops you in the editor and gives you a song. You then have to plot out the song yourself, guessing what notes the song is playing to create it. Death mode is the campaign all over again, but now with a timer and the added objective of forcing you to grab every note collectible in each stage. Both are unique, but more levels with compelling designs would have been more welcome.
I can only hope the community breathes some life into this title. While the few songs that are included are a decent afternoon distraction, in the end, it feels like a wasted effort; the illusion of innovation wrapped in the familiar shell of LocoRoco, LittleBigPlanet, and to a lesser extent, Frequency. Innovation is one thing, but familiarity breeds contempt. THE VERDICTLegacy Comments (will be imported soon)"the illusion of innovation wrapped in the familiar shell of Locco Rocco, LittleBigPlanet" What? There are as many possibilities for level creation here as anywhere. The platforming is tight and fun, the level design in the included campaign is as diverse as the music that accompanies it.
In the first few days they were getting 1000's of levels submitted to the community section, so many so fast that the servers were down for hours or days at a time, and this was before the game was even released in Europe. Not enough levels with the little submarine/spaceship for you? make some yourself, then there will be plenty for everyone! Quite a few websites have level creation contests going on, and some of the submissions i've found are as good as anything in the campaign, albeit without "professionals" making the music, but they can be just as good. I think anyone who likes solid platforming games, music of all varities, and the option to create your own content should check this game out, for the low price of $15 for TWO copies, you can hardly find the amount of innovation included, illusion or not, for the same price. Absolutely couldn't disagree more. Not only does Sound Shapes fully realize its potential, it leaves expectation behind to become easily the best Vita title to date. The real accomplishment of this game is just how incredibly FUN it is to create your content. I've yet to even publish a level, but I've spent hours just tinkering around in creation mode building rhythms and beats just for my own enjoyment. I freakin adore this game. I would also like to add that i agree with everything tristrix has said.
I spend hours and hours just creating music. Everything is so complex but the way the developers created the tools to be so streamlined and user friendly is an accomplishment in its own right. I was really looking forward to this game (it was one of the reasons I got a Vita in the first place), and I didn't find it all that engaging. I'll probably get back to it, but from what I've played (the first two albums and about 5 minutes of the level editor) it does not live up to what I expected it to be. I really want to like it, but it's not happening yet. While I haven't bought the game, I did play the 3 levels that were available at Gamescom and I thought it was amazing. The campaign wasn't meant to be difficult. You just play it to see what the tools are capable of, then you go off and make your own levels. And there are great community levels, you just have to dig under all the mario/zelda levels (something you'd have to deal with in any game with creation tools). If I were reviewing this, it would have been a 9.5 for sure. I don't get any feeling of familiarity at all with this game. There is no "I've done this before" feeling for me. It feels so fresh, so new. And it feels amazingly awesome to control. I mean, there is a reason it has an 85 Metacritic score and about 20 reviews above 9, its an amazing game. I've been loving this game but I still can't connect to the servers to play community levels. I bought it day one and still can't connect to the sound shape servers. Is anyone else having this issue?
PS, great review. I can't say I agree with this review fully. The experience is short, but it has both great platforming elements (especially the Deadmau5 stages) and great music (Beck, and the more ambient ones...)
I do think it's a little overpriced at 15 bucks, but it has a pretty intuitive creation suite and there are some great community levels out there. I think it's closer to an 8, and if it had more songs per album it'd be a 9. This game is excellent, i just wish the included campaign had more albums. On the positive side, there are some nifty user created levels already. Hi guys. I think this may be my first post on Destructoid, not quite sure.
Anyway, I'd like to say that I really like this game. It's been some time since a music-driven or a music affiliated game has put this kind of smile on my face like Sound Shapes does. Games like LocoRoco and Parappa the Rapper are examples of titles with good-feeling fun with nice beats to tag along with it. Despite my adoration for Sound Shapes, all of Ian's points and opinions are valid; The game is pretty damn short, my favorite level is a Beck track, not enough spaceships! etc etc. On the plus side, there's the community levels which could extend your gameplay. It all sounded cool and all at first, but most of the top rated user-created levels were either just one to two screens long, or the "music" they come up with is just a jumbled mess of notes and percussion. While some deserve their spots on the front page, I can't help but think that most of them are only up there because of the title of the levels (eg - Zelda themes, Star Wars themes and whatever popular franchise out there). Now, having these levels be as short as they are, you don't really get the whole song. You only hear 1 or two measures of the most familiar part of the song and that's all you get. By the time to recognize the tune, the level is over! With that said, I took some time (2 hours a day for a week) to create level of my own. It's a bit more lengthy than what you'd normally would find in Sound Shapes' user-generated content, and it has a fair share of difficulty to keep you busy for a bit. If you'd like to check it out, search for "Tremor Corps" in the community pages. Given the time took me to create it, I probably won't do another. I don't expect it to become one of the top rated levels, but I just had to share it with someone. I mean, I spent a whole damn week on it and it's only been played 5 times! Well, that's all from me :) . Hope you guys have fun with it. Ok well I played your level Nepraos. Fun. How the fuck did you do all that in under 4 mins though? took me over 10.
I liked the tune. Enjoyed most of the platforming but I would point out that it's Sound Shapes, not Super Meat Boy. ;) That shit got pretty tough at times. Thank you for making it though. Hearted the level and followed you. @ Nepraos- I'm gonna get your level tonight! Gonna have the developers of the game on Sup Holmes tomorrow, so watch that? So far the community is meeting my expectations, you just need to figure out how to look. The most popular is a list of only a few good ones, but I'm getting a lot of luck trying out the newest releases, then checking out who the people I'm following are following to find even more great songs.
I felt the campaign mode was a little lackluster, but I find myself enjoying the stages more as I replay them, so I guess that's a bonus. Wow, those closing statements are way off for me. This isn't faux innovation, it's something that is actually, genuinely new.
And locco rocco? Do you just assume any game with minimalist graphics is related? I'm actually okay with the score, but the things you knock it for are so weird to me. I do think Sound Shapes has some problems, but primarily with its platforming "feel" and incredibly short included campaign. It's far from lacking in innovation, great design, or community content. @Ian Bonds
"Innovation is one thing, but familiarity breeds contempt." You sound like a pretentious douche bags with comments like this. I slapped together a crap level myself, and called it Glorious Cacaphony. It was my first experience with the mode and I sorta slapped it together in two sessions, each about an hour. It has framerate issues in one area because of one of the enemies that uses aural tones that sorta destroy everything else going on. I'm not great at sequencing, but I love my level like it was a very special child that needed extra love.
I've seen some really great beats on the community side, and I love finding more so if anyone else has cool levels, let me know. I'm gonna go play Nepraos level now... I really enjoyed this game and have gone back to play it a couple more times through. Why? Because the music, platforming, visuals, and overall feel to the game put me in a trance. A groovy trance. I just go with the flow and enjoy it all, losing myself in the experience. :) I love this game so much. I really hope they add more albums as DLC down the road with more electronic musicians like Kaskade. Wow! Jonathan Holmes sent a comment directly to me! I shall die with a smile. Well, not now, but you know. I'm not sure if I'll be able to watch your show today, as I have plans to go to the park with my niece. I'm super happy just for the fact that you took the time to type my name! Woohoo! (jumps and heel clicks)
@Tristrix, thanks for the compliments. Considering that I was the one who created it, I know all the little tricks and maneuvers required to get through it pretty quick. I will point out that my top time can be beat as I died a 2 or 3 times during that playthrough. I mentioned that I might not do another level, but I was messing around with the editor a bit the yesterday and came up with another beat using a lot of the muting technique. I really like how it came out. Creating a beat is the easy part. It's just that editing the platforming takes forever! I always feel that I should not make it too easy or it'll be boring, but not too hard either, or it'll be frustrating. Then there's the test runs, tweaking, making sure all the checkpoints are all in the correct areas and other things that are very time consuming. Ugh! Who knows, there might be a day where I have absolutely nothing else to do and decide to just get it done. Seeing as you (Tristrix) followed me, I'll use that as motivation :) although not yet played this game but express ourselves through the love and look forward to playing through this game: D<a rel="dofollow" href="http://www.thenewipad24h.com/">The new IPad</a> although not yet played this game but express ourselves through the love and look forward to playing through this gamehttp://www.thenewipad24h.com although not yet played this game but express ourselves through the love and look forward to playing through this gamewww.toantai.com/ although not yet played this game but express ourselves through the love and look forward to playing through this game<a rel="dofollow" href="http://www.thenewipad24h.com/">The new IPad</a> Games like this are why people support Sony end of story. While Nin is rehashing Mario for the bajillionth time and M is doing absolutely nothing to further any kind of innovation whatsoever we have small indie devs like this that actually make a living on PSN. To be fair XBL used to be decent but as of late it's a flaming pile. And N is just lost imho. 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2:00 PM on 08.18.2012
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