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Day Tripping – Bit.Trip Beat By: PoisonRamune, the Apathetic Lizardman Aksys Games’ newest entry to the Wii Shop poses a very thought provoking question. Can the primitive 8-bit game, Pong be psychedelic? After playing Bit.Trip Beat throughout the weekend, this question can be answered with a resounding “YES.”
While there generally is no story in the actual game, the story included in the online manual describes Bit.Trip Beat as being like Captain EO told with rave music and a non-homosexual protagonist. The main character (which is represented by a thin Pong paddle) is some sort of psychonaut that travels the galaxy in an effort to spread rhythm throughout outer space. Even though the story is greatly lacking in this game, it’s still a hell of a lot more in-depth than Rez’s story (which I still don’t even know or care about to this day).
The gameplay is very simple. The game plays like an extreme version of Pong. Little bits of debris come from the right hand side of the screen which you must knock away with your paddle man. Since Bit.Trip Beat is on the Wii platform, it works with that motion control stuff we’ve come to know and love (or hate). You hold the Wiimote horizontally and turn it as if it was some radio dial (wow, that’s pretty dated) in order to move the paddle man up and down. The debris patterns start off very simply, mostly being a few consecutive lines of dots. However, as the game progresses the patterns become pretty intense, coming at you in an angular formation or in snake like patterns. Do well and you’re rewarded with even more music, sounds and colors; do bad and you’re game turns into something that looks and sounds like an old black and white Atari game.
As I mentioned before, the game is very reminiscent of Pong, right down to the graphics. However, there’s something vibrant and new about them. Never in all my life have early style 8-bit graphics (pre-NES) given me such a sensory rush (except for Defender and that Journey game on the Atari 2600, but I think I had a developmental disorder as a child). However, in the defense of the 80’s and its classic video games, Bit.Trip Beat isn’t done in a true 8-bit style. There are a lot of nifty little HD generation tricks that have been used here, especially with the backgrounds which range from 3-D shapes in space to rainbow colored splotches of psychedelic insanity.
Along with the trippy visuals, Bit.Trip Beat has an amazing “soundtrack.” I feel I need to put soundtrack in quotes because the music is dependent on how well you do. Not only are you given better sound clips and beats the better you do in the game, but each bit of space debris you hit creates a note making your accuracy in the game even more important. The music is very well produced and catchy, but it does have this very simplistic feel to it. In fact, most of the notes start out those classic “bleeps” and “bloops” found in most early video games. This fits the overall theme of the game, since this really solidifies the game’s mock primitive style. Playing this game while drunk is a chore. It may be fun just because you’re totally loaded and playing a pretty simple game. However, I wouldn’t go playing it while drunk with any hopes of getting very far, since the levels are long and require extreme dexterity and concentration. I would suggest playing this game after smoking a bowl though, it’s simply amazing. The reefer will take you out of your head enough to play the game on instinct. You’ll also experience a very fun syncopated synergy from the game with its flashiness and interesting sounds. Final Verdict:
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