Marble Blast Ultra

Content review for this game:
Pertaining to content listed in the upper left corner of this site.


"E" for Everyone: As this game involves a literal rolling marble making its way through a variety of obstacle courses, there is absolutely no objectional content whatsoever.


Content-wise: Kids 6- could watch this game in its entirety no problem. And they could probably play the first 2 levels, but I don't think they'll want to. I'll explain more in the next category.


Difficulty-wise: The core gameplay involves you controlling a marble through very difficult obstacle courses, with a variety of power-ups, all while being timed the entire way through. The levels are split into Beginner, Intermediate, and Advanced. The controls are simple enough: the A button/L-trigger is to jump, Left stick is to move the marble, Right stick is to move the camera, and the Right-trigger is to use power-ups. The power-ups include Super-jump, Super-speed, and more as you go along. Also scattered throughout levels are hourglasses, and if picked up, they will stop the timer temporarily, to give you a better chance of completing the level's time limit. You won't lose if you go over the time limit, you just won't get a very good score.

Last of all, the game makes use of several surfaces like ice, which will ruin the marbles' traction, and make it very hard to manuever around tight areas, metal surfaces--it increases traction, and allows you to climb areas you otherwise wouldn't be able to--and gravity modifiers, which allow you to pass over and switch gravity to the ceiling, floor or walls.

Difficulty-wise, I could see kids 7+ complete the first 4 beginner levels, but after this, the levels become exponentially harder, and thus more frustrating (and boring for this age group). Kids 10+ could probably complete all of the beginner levels and half of the intermediate levels (depending on how patient and/or interested they are), but the advanced levels are beyond their reach.


Fun for: Overall this game is more for adults than kids. Many of the gameplay elements are just too boring and unappealing to most kids. The advanced levels will give anyone a run for their money, as they are almost impossibly hard (I have yet to complete all of them).


Closing comment: This is an okay game, if you're into this genre. The graphics are adequate (but bland), the gameplay is clever, and it will take you a while to complete the later levels (or forever ;). However, some of the level design is cheap, and the difficulty presented in later levels borders on ridiculous. Content-wise there's no issue for any age. Difficulty-wise, I could see kids 7+ playing a couple of the first levels, and kids 10+ beat about half the game. So (overall), I recommend this game for ages 10+.


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