Gamers love their physics, at least from an observational and sometimes-participatory standpoint, and they love hair-raising tests of technical precision. In turn, I would postulate that a majority loved the schoolyard game of marbles–I know I did. When it comes to the opalescent gleam and vast nomenclature of my favourite fad, I’ve been known to ramble–which is an anagram of marble, by the way. I can think of few applications of my free time that brought me more satisfaction than that winner-take-all exercise in hand-eye coordination, held in trenches dusty and mud-caked alike, the dirt carved by the scooting orbs on their way into the coveted pot.

So now that several federal agencies are ready to certify me, here’s a charming game that doesn’t replicate the dirty game of marbles, but uses them very effectively in the cascading, tilting-world mode. Kororinpa: Marble Mania by Hudson has marbles shaped like darling animals, making the selfsame noises, and stages modeled after pastries set to accordion music. It’s desperately cute until your spherical protegé falls out of your Wiimote-driven control and into the void, at which point it can be despairingly hard. For Monkey Ball veterans it may be small potatoes, but with several unlockables throughout a great variety of stages, Kororinpa is a sweet take on the classic formula.

Posted on June 16th, 2008 by katie