Reviewed: January 25, 2008
Reviewed by: Jeff Gedgaud
Publisher
MumboJumbo
Developer
MumboJumbo
Released: January 8, 2008
Genre: Puzzle
Players: 1
5
5
6
3
4.8
Supported Features:
Screenshots (Click Image for Gallery)
NO SCREENS AVAILABLE
Luxor: Pharaoh’s Challenge is your basic yet inventive puzzle where you shoot a ball at a line of balls marching toward your Egyptian pyramid. If the balls make it to your tomb you lose but if you match three or more balls of the same color you get rid of them.
The really mixed up part of this is once a single line of balls gets so far on the course there starts a second row and so on. You can reverse the line of balls or slow them down for more time as well as use special balls called power ups to get rid of balls quicker. The fun part is the squish sound the scarab beetles make who are pushing the balls along and you reverse the first line into the second. You didn’t think these brightly colored balls magically marched did you?
There are two different game play types; the Adventure and the Endless Tomb with an additional Practice that plays any levels you have previously defeated. The game is really simple with a line of colored balls being pushed by scarab beetles across different Egyptian scenes, the balls are not marching but the scarab beetles might be.
You shoot other balls from your launcher thingy at the bottom that you control with the Wiimote at the line to knock out the balls when you match three or four. Your shooter moves back and forth as well as a target reticule that can move all over the screen to help you’re aiming.
The balls start out as four colors and you gain others as you move up in levels as well as various power ups that are included for fun and ease. The power ups help you control the beetles or get rid of more balls like reverse, slow and stop. You can also get one that increases the speed of your shots as well as adding a targeting beam as well as things like a wild card or other helpful ball destroyers.
There is an additional advantage in this sequel that has you gaining gems and coins that you can use to purchase power ups. Coins are used to purchase additional lives during any level with 30 coins worth an additional life.
The entire game is pretty fun and a pretty good puzzle game but there is really nothing much here other than a quick pick up and play puzzle that will get increasingly hard for you. There is a unique and novel puzzle game for any that like these Tetris-style games but if you’re looking for in-depth adventures or mind-broadening puzzles you need to look elsewhere.
The game board has several Egyptian themed backgrounds like city streets of Cairo back in the days or an Egyptian table with papers and other utensils from that time period while the balls get pushed by curios beetles with a very purposeful manner.
The balls are also very brightly colored so there is no problem telling colors apart as you try to quickly match the color of ball on your shooter with the possible ones plowing across the screen. There is not much variety and like the gameplay or any other part of Luxor: Pharaoh’s Challenge once you have played about ten minutes of the game you have seen and done it all.
They have some very good Egyptian themed music and the game does a good job of keeping the music and audio correctly blended with the games style but that is about all you can say. Of course no voice acting, is there ever any on the Wii system? There is really not much in the way of sound effects other than balls getting magically twinkled out of existence or the rewarding scrunch of a scarab beetle caught between two advancing lines of balls.
Once again the old saying of some very repetitive games comes into play, once you’ve played this for a half an hour you’re done. In thirty minutes of game play you have seen all the puzzles and backgrounds, heard all the sound effects and audio as well as just about seen all the effects and power ups. It will take some time to get really up there in levels but the enjoyment of getting to those higher levels is not enough incentive to playing the same puzzles over and over again.
Luxor: Pharaoh’s Challenge would be a great casual game for quick pick up and play fun but at the cost of almost $40 at the time of this writing it is not worth it. If you find it cheaper and enjoy casual games it would be all right but not at full price for the Wii version.
Luxor: Pharaoh’s Challenge is a casual puzzle game that could be effectively played in about ten minutes or a little more. If you seek the thrill of beating a game and want to see more and more of those little stubborn beetles squished than by all means go ahead and purchase this but wait till the price goes down.