Actionloop Twist Review

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There are also boss levels, where star-shaped baddies zoom around the screen initiating marble snakes in random positions without the comfort of the preset routes you're up against on other levels to foretell potential failure. Each boss level is followed by a bonus level, where you might have 60 seconds to fire rockets at squirreling spaceships, or half a minute to blow up a line of explosives by bouncing marbles off mirrors. Quest levels can get pretty hairy, but you can pick an easier version on the level-select screen without restricting further progress, and you also have a range of power-ups to utilise: a rainbow marble that deletes every marble of a certain colour, another that allows you to fire two small marbles of the same colour at once, effectively allowing you to delete any marble on-screen with a well-placed shot, and stopwatch power-ups that slow, stop and reverse the marble snakes to relax the play conditions.

On top of that, there's competitive and co-operative multiplayer. Although this doesn't support Nintendo Wi-Fi Connection for online play, it does let you play with CPU partners in groups of up to four. Co-op modes set you Quest-style objectives to complete together on the same screen (using the d-pad to swap marble-gun positions and sharing chain reactions), with a Today's Pick mode that rotates through various combinations of stages every 24 hours, tricky Annihilation levels, levels where each of you can only fire certain colours, and a human-only Co-Pilot mode. Competitive modes involve attacking one another with blockers, shunting a rocket out of your side of the screen and racing to clear your marbles first.

There are quite a few multiplayer modes, although no online play.

Whether in single-player or multiplayer, every level you complete contributes to the record room, where progress is monitored for each Mii you've played the game with. As you'd expect from a Nintendo game, everything is warmly and colourfully presented throughout. All the levels are bright and bouncy, and the varied soundtrack is pleasantly hummable. Marble sounds have clacking heft and the chaining sounds, which escalate in pitch as more groups are dragged into the reaction, are twinkling reward for your forethought, while the sight of your Mii merrily spinning around in the centre of the screen is cheering.