Hot Pixel

Has Atari just taken Wario's minigame crown?
Version
 PSP		Developer
Atari		Publisher
Atari		Genre
Minigames



By Dominick Hardy

There's a penchant these days for pick-up-and-play mini-gaming. The significance of the casual gamer 'demographic' has helped fuel this trend, with the spark arguably provided by the WarioWare series. If truth be told though, pick-up-and-play gaming stems from a time long before Wario came up with his nefarious schemes to plunder all and sundry. The early days of the arcade, where games had to hook you in the first few seconds if they were ever going to reel you in and convince you to drop more coins in the slot, had to be pick-up-and-play by their very nature. Could these be classed as the very first casual games?

"The early days of the arcade had to be pick-up-and-play by their very nature."

Regardless, these retro arcade titles are making a comeback in their own right if the slew of classic collections is anything to go by. Surely it won't be long before someone marries the two genres - retro titles and mini-games? Well, given the box blurb - "Inspired by Atari Classics and Street Cultures" - Hot Pixel should be it. It isn't though. Yes, there are some classic arcade references in the pack but they are few and far between and, as is the nature of microsecond mini-games, they are gone in an instant. Hot Pixel is more obviously inspired directly by WarioWare - the mini-games are split into several episodes and there's even a boss at the end of every level - but they couldn't put that on the cover now, could they?

Curiously referred to throughout (except for the box and main screen) as Hot Pxl, the game is aimed at the slightly older MTV generation, containing a Ren & Stimpy level of irreverence. Comprising of 10 episodes in total, completing each one will unlock the next and reward you with a humourous and generally nonsensical 10 second interlude. Each episode contains 12 mini-games including the boss although generally you will not play every mini-game. Some episodes will even recycle mini-games from previous episodes, thus leaving some locked and requiring you to replay the episode several times in order to access everything.

"Playing as Djon, an escaped journalist from the video podcast dimension, you must help him escape from his psychedelic mind."

In titles like this, the plot is defunct yet Hot Pixel provides one. Playing as Djon, an escaped journalist from the video podcast dimension, you must help him escape from his psychedelic mind. Each episode is related to a specific theme in his life - from the underground to awareness, mental tuning and struggle. Truth be told, these themes hold little bearing over the mini-games you will face, which themselves range from the arcade-inspired Arkanoid to the DS-inspired tracing a route along someone's back. The games are delightfully unique on the PSP, but is the kind of thing DS and GBA owners have been playing for years.

Although failing an episode will return you to the episode select screen, for some unfathomable reason completing an episode will throw you back out to the main menu. This is largely irrelevant though as the presentation throughout is generally of a high standard. A major shortcoming though is with the length of the main game. Most players will be able to complete the story mode within an hour or two on the default normal difficulty level - heaven knows how short the easy mode would be. Completing all the episodes on one difficulty setting does unlock further difficulty levels but it is questionable whether there is enough variety to stimulate repeat play.

P L E A S E   V I S I T   O U R   S P O N S O R :

"The best games are invariably the ones that make judicious use of one of the PSP's unique features."

Many of the mini-games fall around the same theme of simply getting from A to B whilst sometimes avoiding other objects. It is this repetitive nature that hinders and will keep some from coming back for more. The best games are invariably the ones that make judicious use of one of the PSP's unique features - steering around with full 360 degrees of movement, all under pixel perfect precision and with the turning, acceleration and inertia afforded to it by the analogue stick.

There is potential though as it is possible to download a further 70 mini-games from www.hotpxl.com and transfer them to your memory stick which can then be accessed in game. How long and how much further developers zSlide and publisher Atari push this though is most likely dependent on the popularity of the title itself.

Whilst complaints will centre around its repetitive, short-lived nature and WarioWare derivation - there's even a tenuous mini-game in the credits which can only be accessed once you've completed all the episodes - it is not all bad news. It is fun to play and does contain countless mini-games, even if many of them are a rip-off of themselves, not to mention the potential for more games via internet download. But is it enough? How long will it keep you coming back for more? If this was an arcade machine, how many 10ps would you drop in the slot? The answer, unfortunately, is probably less than the cost of the game.











Graphics Sound Gameplay Depth Presentation OVERALL
7.5 7.0 6.5 6.0 7.0 6.5


THE VERDICT: Whilst they don't say as much, Hot Pixel is evidently inspired and derived from WarioWare - a rival to the mini-game crown rather than inspired by Atari Classics. Unfortunately it can't touch the highs of the aforementioned seminal titles and - speaking of which - some mini-games seem blatantly better suited to touch-screen and motion control. It is though the best-of-breed on PSP and one which gamers who haven't come across this genre before are likely to enjoy. At least for a short while before it is all over.