Chime Hands-On

Ever wonder what your favorite game designers would come up with if they didn't have any commercial constraints? What would they do in their spare time if they were asked to just come up with something fun? That is what OneBigGame's charity initiative--think Live Aid for video games--wants to accomplish by gathering a team of well-respected developers from all across the industry. The nonprofit publisher and distributor has gathered several talented designers and developers to contribute to the initiative. These include Masaya Matsuura (Parappa), David Perry (Earthworm Jim), and Charles Cecil (Broken Sword). Keep an eye out for what they have coming up because more than 15 games are currently in development. The first game to be completed, though, is a musical puzzler called Chime, which comes from the mind of Steve Curran, a creative director at SingStar and developer at Zoe Mode. Martin de Ronde from OneBigGame stopped by our office to tell us about his organization, as well as show us what people come up with when given complete freedom to design a game.

Martin explained that creating a full-fledged next-gen game was not very practical, so he decided to go with something smaller and asked volunteers to come up with an indie-style flash game or downloadable game instead. Because this is all volunteer work, creating a bite-sized game would make it easier for designers to contribute while working on their next masterpieces at their day jobs. He said the designers could come up with something that could be linked to their backgrounds or they could use their previous creations and put them into a new environment. The only restriction was that the game could not be a message about charity.

Steve originally got into the game industry because of Matsuura's Parappa games. When given the opportunity to create anything he wanted, he immediately wanted to create a tribute to the music rhythm game genre, and Chime was born. Chime brings a couple of the most addictive and easy to pick up games of our time--Tetris and Lumines--together. It takes the ideas from the two games and throws in some unique elements to form something that draws you in just as quickly as the original games. It's like playing Lumines with Tetris-like pieces to hypnotic tunes from such artists as Moby and Paul Hartnoll (Orbital). There will be five tracks total from five different musicians in the game, but those are the only artists we can confirm at this point.

We first took a look at the Free mode, where you aren't given any time constraints as you place the random Tetris-like pieces on a grid. You control the shapes with the analog stick and rotate using the left or right bumpers. When you've decided where you want to place your piece, you press A to lock it down. As in Lumines, your goal is to come up with a three-by-three quad, which will earn you points and cover that part of the grid permanently. A vertical beat line slides from the left to right and acts like a scanner, which checks to see what pieces you have laid down. If it detects a quad, the quad will change color and a meter will start to rise from within. You have a limited amount of time to add to this quad for more points and more coverage of the grid before it fills completely. Ultimately, you want to cover the entire grid with quads, so you'll need to think carefully about placement and how you can chain your blocks together.

The leftover fragments will disappear after a few passes of the white line, but you want to try to add to those pieces for more points. It won't take long before you get the hang of it, and when you do, you'll move over to the Time Trial mode where you can try to complete the level by covering the entire grid within three, six, or nine minutes. The reason the game is called Chime is every time you complete a quad and the beam passes over it, you'll hear a different instrument and tune being played. Layers of music are added as you complete more of the grid, so the soundtrack is constantly changing as you work toward your goal. It's soothing and relaxing, especially when the tracks are from artists who specialize in ambient and electronic music. You'll start off listening to a steady rhythm, but then more instruments and sounds will jump in for the full effect.

The simple visual style works well for this type of game. There isn't too much going on onscreen other than an explosion of flowers when the vertical bar passes through the quads you've made. Once you've placed colored blocks down, you'll also see them change colors with each pass of the beat line. It's not too distracting, either, which makes it easy to focus on better block placement. You'll appreciate it when you play a harder level because you'll find yourself with a grid that is not so easy to fill and blocks (in the shape of a cross) that are not so good when it comes to piecing things together in one seamless chunk.

Chime looks to be a great first entry in what OneBigGame hopes will be a continuous series of creative games released on a regular schedule. This musical puzzler will be available on Xbox Live Arcade for 400 Microsoft points later this year. Proceeds (more than 60 percent of purchase price) will go to charity organizations, such as Save the Children and the Starlight Foundation. There will be a PC version as well, which might include additional tracks at a later time.