There's no doubt that And Yet it Moves is one of the very best WiiWare games yet available, marrying inventive platforming and incredible controls; but I just can't shake this feeling that the game just leaves me cold. It's perhaps a totally irrational response to a game that does so much right, but at times I found the game just a touch academic, when I feel that an approach to the game's aesthetics in a similar vein as, say, World of Goo, would have been more appropriate.
First, though, let's get all of the good stuff out of the way. It's become quite clear that WiiWare is the avenue of choice for indie PC developers, and And Yet it Moves is only the latest in a long line of ported PC games to the service. It's great for someone like me, who only has access to a Mac with any regularity, and who prefers to keep my gaming and my computing separate. Brokenrules have ported this game over with great care, and having done some reading on the game, it looks like the WiiWare version is the one to get for sure, and not just because you can see it on a TV rather than a computer monitor.
For those of you unaware of what this game is about, And Yet it Moves is purely a game – there's no story involved at all. And like most platformers, it's about getting your little dude to the end of the level. Where And Yet it Moves differs from the standard platformer formula is in its main "gimmick," which is the ability to completely rotate the world around your character. This sets up a number of near-puzzle situations, in that obstacles can really only be traversed by using this ability. Obstacles range from the standard (a platform is too high to reach, so you rotate the world and it becomes accessible) to the near-absurd (for instance, in one situation, bananas keep falling from a tree, and rotating the world so that the banana doesn't splat and instead lands in the hands of a gorilla who blocks the way, allowing you passage). It's extremely intelligent game design, and despite my use of the word "gimmick," it absolutely isn't that. Not really, anyways.
The rotation of the world is a deep enough mechanic to support a game of this length for sure. There have been complaints around the internet about the length of the game (only two hours), but this game pushes this main gameplay mechanic to its absolute limit. The last few levels are hellaciously challenging, requiring a combination of expert planning and lightning fast reflexes. This particular section really plays up the main way in which your character can die, which is that falling due to rotating the world causes your character to gain a ton of momentum and explode upon contact with the ground. It's a funny little thing to watch in the game, and I found actually alleviates some of the frustration of the later levels. Anyways, this is my roundabout way of saying that I can't envision this game being much longer than it is already, nor do I think that downloadable games (and more specifically, downloadable platformers) need to be much longer than this.
So the level design and gameplay are all rock solid, and using any of the four combinations of control types all perform beautifully. Old-school NES fans might really enjoy the sideways Wii remote option, which involves twisting the remote to rotate the world. Other options include the Classic Controller (which works well, but is much less satisfying than the other options), using the pointer to grab the edge of the screen and rotate, and my personal favourite, which uses the Wii remote and nunchuk, and has you turning the Wii remote like a key. It just feels spot on. And a bonus, which actually probably makes the game a bit easier than its PC counterpart, is that the Wii version allows you to rotate the world in minute increments, whereas the PC version only allowed rotation in 90 degree increments. I found that I was probably solving puzzles in really unorthodox ways because of this, and I think that's a very cool thing.
Now, I stated upfront that I felt that this game left me a little cold, and that's mainly due to its aesthetics. At first, I was very enthusiastic about them. It's a very cool idea to make an entire game world out of bits of torn up magazines in theory, but in practice, I found the atmosphere of the game to be offputting for no real discernible reason. The look of the game becomes kind of monotonous really fast, and I found that the use of bizarre, atmospheric noises in the place of an actual soundtrack to be a grave misstep. I just really didn't see a reason to instill such a sense of coldness, of distance, between the player and the action. This is perhaps only a personal preference, but it came off as just a little too "indie" for my tastes.
With that being said, though, there's no doubt that And Yet it Moves is a very cool little game, and very fun to play, and there's nothing wrong with that.