Hudson Gamers’ Day: Marble Saga Kororinpa (Wii)

Fri, Nov 7, 2008

Visiting with Hudson Entertainment at last night's Gamers' Day, we watched curiously as members of the gaming press used a Wii Balance Board to propel a spherical kitten around a cardboard box. You'd think such an activity would be fairly self-explanatory, wouldn't you? However, what we were witnessing was Hudson's upcoming Wii title, Marble Saga Kororinpa, a sequel to 2007's Marble Mania. As the night wore on, the rolling kitten was joined by marbles, globes, and even caged Miis as they rolled their way around a variety of environments, collecting crystals and dodging hazards via Wiimote or Balance Board control.

Based on the popular "tilt the world to roll the marble" game mechanic as utilized in Super Monkey Ball, Marble Mania came out to mixed reviews; gamers generally praised the fully 3D gameplay while criticizing the game's abrupt length and low difficulty. As Hudson's Bob Goad explained to us during our hands-on (and feet-on) exploration, Hudson has engineered Marble Saga to address those prominent criticisms, including more levels, more marbles, more difficulty levels, 4-player races, Balance Board stages, and a stage editor.

Goad, a senior project specialist at Hudson, helped us wrap our minds around Marble Saga's gameplay. I missed out on the game's immediate predecessor, though my marble-rolling skills had been honed through a number of Super Monkey Ball titles, so I was able to quickly adapt. For those unfamiliar with Kororinpa's specific M.O., though, the biggest change lies in the degree of control one can exert on the game world. Like its simian contemporaries, Kororinpa is controlled by tilting the actual stage, sending the marble-avatar rolling appropriately as gravity carries it onward. In the Kororinpa games, however, that control has no limit -- it's possible to rotate the world a full 360 degrees in any direction, going to far as to flip the entire stage upside-down. This can lead to a number of spatial puzzles, changing gravity to turn walls into floors, ceilings into walls, and crushing weights into propelling springs.

The primary gameplay of Marble Saga -- the "core" game, so to speak -- centers around the title's 150+ stage single-player story mode. The story follows Anthony the Ant, a tiny little character who will occupy one corner of the screen as you guide your marble through various worlds in search of golden crystals. Collecting all of the crystals will unlock the level's exit, bringing Anthony one step closer to his final goal, reaching the golden sunflower. It's a shallow story, but then, gamers have never needed too much justification to roll a marble around through space stations and graveyards. Still, Anthony will keep you company during your ordeals, advising you to watch out for obstacles, encouraging you when you near the exit, and complaining on occasion that he is hungry.

The game's early stages are easy enough, requiring only that you roll your way through a handful of walled-in mazes, but as the game progresses, the worlds become far more topsy-turvy. Soon, the aforementioned spatial puzzles will start to show up, and completing a level will require some particularly tricky Wiimote acrobatics, frequently requiring the player to use both hands as the controller is flipped completely over and back again. In addition, Marble Saga offers three levels of difficulty, to address prior complaints about the game's ease of completion. "You'll be in store for a challenge," warned Goad, who advised us that the harder difficulty levels would have fewer guardrails and walls, requiring extremely delicate balance and control in order to survive. What's more, said Goad, the levels would contain hidden, unlockable items, often in places off the beaten path -- players will need to perform some wrist-straining maneuvers in order to fully explore Marble Saga's world.

This is not to say that Marble Saga is designed purely around controller-hurling frustration. Aiding players on their journey are 20 or so unlockable avatars, each with its own advantages in navigating the game world. Each ball, marble, or otherwise is rated for statistics like "bounce," "speed," and "slide," and several have their own special abilities. Some of these are practical or game-altering (I'm fairly sure I saw one avatar that was a polyhedron rather than a sphere), whereas others are purely aesthetic: The aforementioned kitten ball, for example, has the special ability to make "cute sounds." Another such ball allows players to customize a character to roll around inside their marble, including preset avatars such as Bomberman, or even their own Miis.

Other features in Marble Saga include a series of special stages to be played via the Wii Balance Board. We tried these stages out, and they work about like you'd expect -- if you've played some of the balance-based mini-games that come with Wii Fit, then you're familiar with the basic "lean your body to tilt the world" mechanic. Needless to say, you won't be flipping the world completely over in these stages -- though it would certainly be interesting to see someone try.

The most promising feature, with regards to expanding Marble Saga's length and replay, is the game's new utilization of Wii Connect 24. Marble Saga can now be brought online, allowing you to compare stage times on leaderboards, or even share your own stage creations from the level editor. What's more, Hudson is promising to support the game via DLC, claiming players can "Receive extra stages from Hudson after launch via the Nintendo Wi-Fi Connection." Assuming players will be initially hooked by the title's single- or multi-player fun, adding new stages ought to address the primary "longevity" complaint rather handily.

Marble Saga Kororinpa is scheduled to launch on the Wii in Spring 2009.