De Blob Review

Anannya Sen’s Review

Blobtastic action.

If you can picture an out of control space hopper smearing paint over everything as it rolls and bounces along then you have a general idea of what De Blob feels like to play.

It's certainly an interesting game, and the premise is fairly unusual. Everthing in the world is grey thanks to the evil INKT corporation and as a manic anarchist, De Blob, it's your job to bring colour back to the city and happiness back to the masses.

Of course the corporation is never really explored and even the character of De Blob is not explained at all. But then it doesn't have to be, as this game is a whole load of fun without it.

De Blob is basically a big fat space hopper that absorbs balls of colour to transform him into that colour. Once you have a colour if you bounce into and off buildings, you'll transform them into the colour you are. Get another colour and the colours may well combine to create a third. This way you can use lots of different colours on your building painting escapades.

The colours aren't the only thing you can paint either, as there are trees, grass and even citizens you can bring colour to. The more colours you absorb, the bigger a blob you will be up to four levels worth. This is useful to note as certain buildings in each level require you to be a minimum size and specific colour in order to paint them.

Of course, if you're the wrong colour you can just plant yourself in one of the many fountains to cool off and remove some of that ink and size. Size also plays an important part in control as when you are a small blob you can zip around and stop on a dime. As you get bigger, you get slower but with a bit more control.

And control is needed for you to jump and splat on the evil INKT henchmen. You'll see them coming when the green target reticule appears. Press the main button or 5 and you'll leap onto them, squashing them Giant Haystacks stylee. On the later levels there will be quite a few of these annoying things hunting in packs so pressing 5 rapidly causes a hopping squash fest to ensue. Why are they so annoying? Because if you hit one, you don't die, rather lose your colour and the dark ink that stains you has to be washed off. Oh, if you bump into any buildings etc while in this mode, you will make them revert to grey.

Never fear though, because the paint balls are regularly interspersed throughout each city block you explore. So a quick dry off and colour up and it's back on the squashing painting trail. On each level, in addition to the buildings you may have to paint a specific colour, are some challenges. These range from getting somewhere fast through a bunch of checkpoints (double tap a direction to see De Blob aerodynamically squeeze for a faster trajectory), taking out INKT agents within a time limit, or painting a specific number of buildings.

What's really addictive about this game is the combination of explosions of colour as you paint the city, and the zipping and larking about while doing it. There's a trusty percentage bar on hand to show you how much of the block you've painted. Never fear, as you don't have to paint all of it, rather get a specific number of points to open the exit gate to the next block.

There are plenty of awards you can earn (stars) for each level which involve finishing it within a certain time limit, gaining a specific number of points etc etc. And if you collect all the letters of the word BLOB which are scattered around the level you will certainly get quite a few points.

After a while you realise the game is pretty much the same, except for more INKT agents everywhere. The game does reward you for trying to paint evenly so if you are really pedantic about it, you could give this a go. Still, the more you play, for some reason the more fun it is. You get used to the challenges and just keep playing to see that colourmeter increase and also see the buildings change colour whenever you bump into them.

The one downside I would say is that it can be a bit frustrating when there are so many INKT agents on the later levels, and although you've pressed the jump button, because De Blob is quite fat and sometimes direction inputs are a little slow, you may find yourself getting inked a bit more than you like. But follow the handy blue arrows to the nearest water, wash off then return to git those suckas.

A hugley colourful game that, even though repetitiive, is addictive enough for you to keep coming back for more and seeing those grandiose explosions of colour.