Boom Boom Rocket: An Honest Look

[Sk8teland85]

A little while back my sisters 360 broke and she decided to replace her it since it was no longer under warranty and the cost to get it fixed was half of the cost of the a new one. So she went ahead and got a 360 Arcade model which she forgot came with some games. Not only did it come with Sega Superstar Tennis which was nice, but is also had a disk of X-Box Live arcade games which was was not a surprise to me since it is called the 360 Arcade model. Among these games was one I did not know much about Boom Boom Rocket. It looked interesting that is for sure and when I found out it was made by the same team that made Geometry Wars I figured I might as well give it a shot and here are my thoughts.

Boom Boom Rocket is at it's core basically a rhythm game where you have to set off fireworks to the beat of the music playing in the background it kinda reminds me of an early PS2 game called FantaVision. Anyway to set off these Fireworks you need to press the appropriate face button at the right time. Now you can set the icons to display as either the button that needs to be pressed of the direction the button is at on the controller. I personally preferred the latter since it made more sense to me. Now overall this works very well although there are some times when a lot of fireworks are on screen at once that it has issues since the buttons are so close to each other.

Now to just time setting them off right

Once I got into the game I will admit it is not that bad overall. Yes it can be a bit hectic at times but it works and is fun for the most part. Although after a few songs I started getting bored with it. This is mainly due to me just sitting there pressing buttons to the beat and that is all. Unlike games like Dance Dance Revolution or Guitar Hero where you are on your feet dancing or playing a fake guitar in this game you are just sitting down and timing button presses, which kinda makes the whole thing feel kinda like an over elaborate quick time event.

Another thing I did not like so much was the music. I mean the tracks were nice but I wanted to hear some of the famous tracks I hear when I go to a real firework show the way they were intended to be heard. These remixes they have just don't have the flair the original versions have and that is a real shame if you ask me. I never like when they try and modernize a classic since most of the time it just does not work.

Overall I feel this game was a missed opportunity to make something truly great. It still is a nice game but lacks the polish to make it more that just decent. The idea is an interesting one but they just need to find a way to make the player feel more involved in the game. I hear that the game does support DDR and Guitar Hero controllers and maybe that helps make it a bit more entertaining I will have to try that and see. As for if I would recommend this game well the game is 800 Microsoft points to download but comes free with the X-Box 360 Arcade. It is not bad as a free game with the 360 Arcade that is for sure, but to me at least the 800 Microsoft points/10 dollars to download it is a bit high. So I would say look into this one first if you are thinking of downloading it.

[Macawmoses]

You know, I've never even heard of it before now. So while it seems to have its flaws, I think it deserves an "honest look" from me.

[Shujinco2]

Yeah.. it's kinda fun. But I was never good at DDR esque games... so I kind of suck.

But still... I play it once and a while.

The Arcade game that has me hooked though in Pacman C.E.