Game Reviews

Balanz

Star onStar onStar onStar halfStar off
|
| Balanz
Get
Balanz
|
| Balanz

Balanz is a game that gets better in proportion with the number of friends you have. It's a sort of demented version of pass the parcel without any unwrapping, mixed up with a good dollop of Jenga, and a sizeable portion of balancing sticks on your hands.

With two people it's a slightly confusing experience, but with a few more friends around it becomes a tense, often hilarious game that will have you cackling and swearing into the wee small hours.

And you can't play it on your own, so it's really rubbish if you're a hermit or a social recluse.

Friends with balances

The idea behind the game is pretty simple. You pick the number of people playing, stand in a circle, and then start to pass the phone or tablet along.

Each person in the circle will be called upon in turn to push a finger onto a circle, then carefully pass the device onto the next person. She'll do the same, and the first player will release their finger.

In the Casual mode, every time a new finger is pushed onto the screen a new box is added to an ever-growing tower. This tower is rickety at best, and each box makes it even wobblier.

If it teeters too close to the edge of the playing area that screen will start to flash red and whoever's button is pushed down will start to lose some of her life force. There's no need for the next player to take the phone or tablet on if it's not steady, so keeping the tower straight is your aim.

Of course, people might give you an elbow in the ribs, and the Hard and Party modes add stricter time limits for the handovers, and forfeits for the loser to perform at the end of the game.

Multiplayer tilts

It's not without its problems, and it does take a bit of getting used to, which can sometimes spell an early death for a party game. But it's presented well, and once things are up and running there's a lot of fun to be had.

Balanz is one of those games that does something different and clever with a tablet, while still being a lot of fun. If you're having some friends over to play some games, then give it a go. Just don't blame me if it ends in fisticuffs.

Balanz

A clever idea that doesn't quite spark into life until you get a few more people around your iPad, Balanz is still a great party game once it gets going
Score
Harry Slater
Harry Slater
Harry used to be really good at Snake on the Nokia 5110. Apparently though, digital snake wrangling isn't a proper job, so now he writes words about games instead.