This was under my radar, and then my radar 'sploded.
Let me start by saying I had no real expectations of Splosion Man. Before I tried the game I hadn't seen more than a dashboard screenshot and knew nothing of the details of the game. From the first moments of the game starting up, I could tell this was going to be one of those Arcade titles that doesn't take itself seriously. The game is humorous and fun because it's just trying to allow the player to have fun. You take control of a lab experiment that results in a man who is able to "splode" himself at will. Didn't know splode was a word? Me neither, but I guess it is now. Anyway, the game is essentially a 2D platformer in the vein of other simple, but hard to master titles. It starts out straightforward enough. You can splode yourself three times, essentially giving you three jumps. After each splosion, the character will lose his fiery look and start to appear like charcoal or ash. He will regain color after a few seconds and it's back to sploding.
Like I said, simple, but fun. So your sploding serves as your main form of jumping and attacking, but the level throws so much at you. It's one of those titles that has a few options but many possible results. Kind of like how in Braid all you can do is jump and rewind time, yet the level design progresses and it makes your ability to think and react part of the game itself. You will have to master your skills and explore (or explode) every little inch of a level to get unlockables (you can even unlock gamerpics and a premium theme), achievements, and complete the game. Splosion Man will throw lots of puzzles at you, epic boss fights, sentry turrets, wall jumps, and some very intense and fast paced action. It also has time trials and some very fun four player multiplayer. The multiplayer itself is almost a completely different game entirely. Four player co-op reliant on teamwork brings you a platforming experience not unlike that of LittleBigPlanet. Splosion Man is definitely an instant classic of the Xbox Live Arcade and needs to be played right now.