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No, they're not amphibious Teletubies...
they just look that way:
Picture this… A square field and blocks of varying
shapes that fall from the sky and raise the elevation of the
field where they land. Now add in clumps of water that flows
to the lowest point on the field, like real water, when these
clumps hit the ground. There are also blocks that lower the
ground, and bombs that destroy land and blow holes in the
ground for the water to escape as well as fireballs that evaporate
pools of water and ice cubes that freeze pools. The object
of all this is to make a chunk of land that is capable of
holding the water that falls from the sky and then score points
by evaporating as much of it at one time as possible. Lose
too much water off the edge, and you lose the game. That’s
pretty much all there is to it.
Graphically, it’s passable. The colors are bright and
cheerful, which is not unreasonable for a puzzle game of this
type. The little mascots of the game, the Aquas, are annoyingly
cute but you can squash the little bastards with falling blocks
since they’re running around the game field during play.
Sadly, this is not fatal to them. If there’s any real
complaint about the game though, it’s the controls.
It’s far too easy to place a block just slightly off
target and end up with a little crack that lets all your damn
water out. There are precious few small blocks as well, so
filling this gap is almost always a very wasteful action that
is absolutely required unless you want to loose the game in
very shoot order.
Overall, it’s a nice little puzzle game, but I find
that the controls add way too much frustration for it to be
genuinely fun to play. Between the original Tetris and Bust
a Move, it’s hard to make a new puzzle game that really
keeps its head above water.
-K'Tok
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| Yeah, so it’s
inspired by Tetris. It’s not a direct rip off though,
so that’s better than average. The dynamics of the water
are nice as well. |
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| While
it is possible to get hooked into this game, you have to overlook
the horrid controls. I got hooked at first, but after I put
the controller down and didn’t play it for a few days,
I found I had very little desire to pick it up again. |
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| There’s
nothing to create a “wow” factor here, but the graphics
serve their purpose nicely. Again, the water effects are nice,
but nothing special. |
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| There’s nothing
important to mention about the sound, other than that the music
can get very aggravating after a while. It’s just very,
very average. |
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| This is a tough
call. The main problem with the controls is that they are too
fast and don’t allow for precise placement of your blocks.
The fact is though, that a game like this needs fast controls.
It’s a double-edged sword, but I feel the developers could
have found a way to make it work better if they had invested
a little more time. |
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Publisher: 3DO
Developer: Zed
Two
System: Playstation
2
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Inane Factoid:
Aqua Aqua is also knows as Wetrix in its Dreamcast and N64
incarnations. As far as I can tell, the aquatic Teletubies
that you see above, also known as Aquas, had nothing to do
with those versions. Why they felt compelled to bring the
little bastards to the PS2 version is a mystery.
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