First off I rate very harshly (8/10 is the highest I've ever given a game). Anyway for a free game it's not bad.
Pros: - Makes sense and is a good difficulty level
- It can give you 200 free Gamerscore (well 175... I would never try for the hardest achievement)
- It's Free!
- Innovative
Cons: - Repetitive
- No multiplayer
- No saving in the middle of something painful (like survival mode)
- It may waste a few hours of your life
Graphics: ?/10
The graphics don't affect the rating of this game at all for me. I mean if it was 3D then it would be beyound confusing and it basically looks how it should (No marks added or taken away).
Gameplay: 5/10
I like games where you do stuff. In this game you do a bit, but not enough fo me. I do find it "intense" though that this game can go as far as having 6 black pearls around a square. I've yet to get six of those silver flower things around a square. Anyway the game has 3 different modes which are all a bit different and will last for a bit of time before getting repetitive (That 15G for beating Survival mode was fairly "meh" from about level 15-40).
Music/Sound: 6/10
The music at some points actually makes the game a bit less boring at some parts and a sound every 5 seconds or so at least keeps you from falling asleep. I do like the sounds for when you make on of those flower things though. Maybe I'll one day hear the sound for getting a black pearl and I'll be thrilled for 1.2 (maybe 1.3) seconds. So sound is neither good nor bad, but helps the replay value a bit.
Replay Value (My harshest rating): 4/10
First off I think how good a game is is mostly based on how good it's replay value is. How much you will play it before you get bored. Here's my criteria:
0/10: No replay value. Bored as soon as you start.
1/10: 1 hour. Play 10 minutes here, 10 minutes there you'll eventually play for an hour.
2/10: 3 hours. Same as 1 hour just play small increments of time if you're ever bored and 3 hours isn't hard for a game to achieve.
3/10: 5 hours. Either a very short game that is only fun the first time through or just a game that isn't your favorite.
4/10: 10 hours. The first playable game. Either a short game that is only good first time through or maybe just a pick-up-and-play game that isn't the worst.
5/10: 20 hours. Typical game that you should've rented before you bought. A 20 hour game isn't bad, but get a new game soon after or you'll be bored.
6/10: 40 hours. Here it is, the definition of a "game". It lasted about 40 hours in which it's fun at first has a few peaks, a few parts where you slightly frustrated where to go, has some replay value after beating it and a working multiplayer.
7/10: 100 hours. A must have. This game will last you. You will play it, beat it, play it some more, beat it some more, show it to your friends, think you're all good and play XBOX Live and you'll try to get lots of achievement points after doing pretty much everything.
8/10: 300 hours. The sacred number and the highest I've ever rated a game. A game that lasted you this long is probably the best you'll find in your lifetime (a 9/10 if you're lucky). Unless og course you're really hard core and simply play too much. Anyway this falls into the category "Masterpiece". Of all the hundreds of games I've ever played only a few deserve to be in this category (Zelda LTTP, Zelda OoT, SSBM (maybe)... remember I was a Nintendo fanboy).
9/10: 1000 hours. Well there is no such thing, so I don't have much to say. Basically OoT as an MMORPG... a massive world, many new weapons (same controls though), co-op quests individual quests, DLC every week or 2, fighting others, etc, take a masterpiece and make it flawless.
10/10: 10000 hours. No matter if a game is flawless it's really not possible to never get bored. I mean it's the same game whether there is new DLC content or not. Sorry this will never be achieved (according to me). 1,000,000G to whoever pulls it off.
Sorry for the length, and btw I rated the game before I actually went hardcore with my system. If you wanted to get all achievements in this game you'd have "fun" for 8-9 hours or so. Well 11/12 achievements... good luck on the hardest one.
Difficulty: 7/10
Well without knowing what to do you can get maybe 2-4/12 achievements. If you read what do do and understand flowers and are patient enough to try to make them sometimes and go through survival w/ a bit of thinking you'll get 4-6/12 achievements easy. Play for about 10 hours and you should be up to 8 or so achievements (just for playing a certain amount of time/combos). Also you'll probably be able to make a black pearl or 2 by then. Now to master this game would take time and I don't think the games replay value will have most ppl getting all achievements, but the game is a good difficulty. Maybe a tad too hard for full completion... but hey I think all games should always have just that one thing that is above the rest (like TTFAF on GH3 for whoever knows what I'm talking about).
Overall: 5/10
Whether those numbers average to 5 is another story, but the game is simply a 5/10. It is neither good nor bad, it's almost interesting, gets boring a bit too fast, but it's free so you might as well try it since it's already on your system.