Marble Blast's bland graphics, frustrating controls make this a game to pass on in Xbox Live Arcade.
In Marble Blast Ultra, you are a marble. You roll around various dangerous environments to collect gems and then to reach the end point to move on to your next level. Marble Blast has 60 different levels: Twenty beginner courses, twenty intermediate courses, and finally, twenty advanced courses. Normal players should be able to blast through the beginner courses, and most of the intermediate courses, but after that, the game gets really tough, really fast.
The advanced courses are so difficult in a "cheap" and contrived way, that if it wasn't for me being an achievement point addict, I wouldn't even bother trying to squeeze out every bit of value I can for my ten bucks. The game at the advanced levels can really come down to luck more than skill, and that just doesn't make the game addicting.
There is also no real story to the game, but it is to be expected. You can't really craft a story around a marble, can you?
Another thing that really disappoints in the visuals and the sound. The visuals look good for an Arcade title, but you see the same thing over and over again, it just gets to be a bit tedious.
The same problem plagues the sound. You will just have a techno song looping in the background throughout the whole game, and eventually it'll have you reaching for the remote to mute your television.
Lastly, the controls in the game tend to get really frustrating. The controls don't feel tight and responsive and the camera can get a bit jerky in spots, causing you to fall off the edge and have to go back to the beginning or back to a checkpoint.
One bright spot, though, is the multiplayer. You run around trying to pick up the gems that are respawning throughout the map. When you have eight players going towards five or six gems, the games can get pretty crazy, and the multiplayer achievements might be something you want to strive for instead of the advanced course achievements.
Overall, the total package just isn't enough to justify buying this game. Marble Blast has too many flaws for too high of a price to justify a purchase. If you're really looking for a new Arcade title, you should really look elsewhere.