Alien Jelly

Update: Alien Jelly is now 80 Microsoft Points.

Statistically speaking, this review likely won’t be too popular.  It’s a trend I’ve noticed.  When I review a game from this particular genre, people immediately tune out and my page views seem to fall off a cliff.  Now, after careful research conducted by top scientists from one of those fancy institute places, we’ve devised a way to keep people’s attention while informing them of a really cool game.  Let’s see if it works.

Okay then.  Alien Jelly is a new logic-puzzler BOOBS on Xbox Live Indie Games.  Your goal is to navigate a series of cubes from one part of the puzzle TITS to the flying saucer at the end.  Along the way, you’ll have to shove crates around, teleport, build staircases, and all your typical puzzle RIMJOB fare.

It’s kind of a shame that I have to be so damn shameless in writing this review.  Alien Jelly has so much more going for it than your average logic puzzle KNOCKERS game.  It’s got amazing graphics and loads of personality.  Clearly taking inspiration from the Tim Burton movie Mars Attacks, Alien Jelly is a game that practically begs to be played.  As a puzzle game DIRTY SANCHEZ, Alien Jelly is also well realized.  It’s quite similar to Blockt, a game I previous covered and enjoyed just well enough.  You move your cubes one space at a time.  Here, you can’t fall off the ledge.  The only way to die is to run into a trap or by maneuvering your cube onto a space of another cube’s color.

No amount of Slim Whitman will save you from this.

In most of the forty stages, you have to move more than one block.  You switch back and forth using the A button.  It was here that a very fun glitch came into effect.  On a few stages, the “jelly” around the cubes disappeared, leaving me just the brain.  I wasn’t sure at first if this was a glitch or some kind of “you fucked up” punishment.  I’m pretty sure it was a glitch, because sometimes I just couldn’t recreate it.  It never happened to more than one cube each stage, so it was just a minor annoyance, but it was present.

A bigger problem is the camera.  It has to be moved manually, and it’s a royal pain in the ass to position correctly.  It leads to situations where you can’t see what is on the ledge below you.  You can’t fall to your death, but if there is a ledge under you, the game allows you to drop down to it.  Depth perception proved problematic through-out, but again, you can’t die.  And if you make a mistake, there’s a nifty rewind function that allows you to quickly undo it.  Rewinding also factors into the actual puzzle process, as you keep any gems you collect, even if you erase the moment where you got them.  It’s pretty slick.

Overall, Alien Jelly is probably one of the best of its breed on XBLIG.  Yea, the camera was inexcusably horrible, but because it can’t actually kill you, who gives a shit?  The puzzles themselves are well designed, the theme is pretty good, the production values are high, and it’s just a lot of fun.  Even if you’re not into this type of game, nothing here is so insanely challenging that it should leave you too stumpified.  So give it a try, and maybe you’ll discover a love for puzzle games SEX HOOTERS MAMMARY GLANDS!

Sigh, this is probably where Tourette Syndrome comes from.

Alien Jelly was developed by Collective Mess

240 Microsoft Points giggle immaturely whenever an alien says it has “come in peace” in the making of this review.

My friends at GameMarx are giving away over FIFTY Xbox Live Indie Games as part of a huge contest.  Click here for the Youtube announcement video, and then click here to enter.