Game Reviews

Magnetized

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Magnetized
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Marketing blurb can be misleading. Take the brief App Store description for Magnetized, which calls the game, "an abstract physics adventure game".

Its spare angular electronic appearance is certainly abstract, and there are physics involved in the way that the game's magnetic nodes exert a stronger pull on objects that are closer to them, but it's difficult to see where the adventure comes in. Magnetized is a slick, playable, but unarguably adventure-free experience.

"Touch your screen to active (sic) the power of magnets and escape from neon maze!" it goes on. While this is a fair description of the gameplay, that only holds for the first of the game's three worlds.

Each stage is a blocky room through which you have to safely steer a little ball, using magnetic attraction to swing it around corners and guide it down channels.

Only one node - the closest to you - is ever active at a time, which is a tedious but necessary restriction as you'd otherwise have to conceal the action with your hand by touching the nodes directly. This control limitation means you don't have much scope to recover from mistakes. Swing too far and you're toast.

Pole position

There's generally only one available solution, so success is all about getting your timings right. There are also three power pills per stage, and you need to collect a certain number of these to unlock stages and worlds.

The second world is different. Here the magnets are gone, or at least they're replaced by strange magical super-magnets that pull objects towards them in a straight line but don't affect their direction of travel. This completely changes the gameplay, placing an emphasis on lateral thought as well as basic reflexes.

And the third world is different again, introducing teleporters that transport your ball to the opposite point in the level - e.g. if the ball is one inch to the south-west of the teleporter, tapping the screen will place it one inch to the north-east.

This means you can (fatally) teleport the ball into the middle of a wall, and some of the walls move, and in some cases there's precious little free space to warp your ball into and precious little time in which to make decisions, and then you have to deal with magnets and super-magnets as well, all of which turns a mildly tricky reaction-based casual game into an absolutely berserk hair-tearing nightmare.

Rules of attraction

Having dispensed with the technical details, Magnetized's App Store description goes on to tackle its broader themes. "Chasing dreams is like walking alone on an endless road, direction is so clear but way too long, trying so hard but no one knows. Is it worth it anymore? Just carry on!" Quite.

It's true that the direction is usually clear - particularly in the early stages, where the challenge resides in getting your timing right - but at "up to 80 levels" it's hardly way too long. And I should point out that as far as I can tell there are only 60 levels, but I haven't managed to finish the last one so it's possible that more become available.

The stuff about chasing dreams and walking alone is simply bunkum. Magnetized isn't particularly profound, but that doesn't stop it being a solid, well-made postmodern neon casual game in the tradition of Pivvot and Super Hexagon, combining its three mechanics to hair-rending effect while steadily equipping you with the skills to conquer them.

It's not quite in the same league as the best of its kind, but if you're on the lookout for another stylish, original, and challenging casual-puzzle game you'll find Magnetized an attractive prospect.

Magnetized

Magnetized isn't quite up there with the best of its challenging ultra-modern kind, but it's a worthwhile and novel casual game nonetheless
Score
Rob Hearn
Rob Hearn
Having obtained a distinguished education, Rob became Steel Media's managing editor, now he's no longer here though.