Vib Ripple

[Treble]

http://www.play-asia.com/paOS-13-71-...-5-15-vib.html

Got this yesterday, and have been nattering with Papercut (who's doing the review) about it. Therefore, prepare thyselves for Treb's impressions...

Presentationally, the game pretty much follow's Ribbon's credo, with lots of wobbly vector-style lines creating the text. My memory of Ribbon is a bit shaky (years since I last saw it running), but it seems to be very similar, but with added colour. The loading bar, for instance, is made of the same shapes you get in-game in Ribbon - a nice touch. Vibri guides you through the intro screens (very Japanese text-heavy), and it's all very stylised and basic, which seems to work.



Too much pink for my liking, though. Pink's for gayers
Gameplay is simple: bounce on a trampoline. Keep the rhythm of the bounce with circle.The tramampoline is covered by a photo, and different areas of the photo contain little cute icons you have to reveal by bouncing on them.



You have a strict time limit of 3 mins (so far - don't know if it lengthens or shortens later on), and have to uncover a set munber of icons in that time. There are blob-like enemies that wander around the trampoline, which must be avoided. Contact with these reverts your form to that of a frog, as failure did in Ribbon too. However, it seems as if, if you keep the consistency of your bouncing continuous and smooth, you turn into a golden Vibri, which can extinguish enemies.



And that's about it. There are collection elements (naturally),based on revealing new icons, and you earn a gold crown if you meet some sort of critieria, which Papercut thought might be this:

Good bouncing gives you more powerful jumps, which allows you to trash parts of the pic that don't hold hidden items (helpful to remember where you've tried). This also ups your score (what I think actually leads to the crown rankings).

So, what do I think? Well, it's ok. Keeping the rhythm going is fairly easy, but not as tactile as it ought to be. You need to hit circle as you hit the canvas, then release it when the trampoline has reached its apex, as it were. Sadly, there's no real key to doing this: rumble is used to show when you've found an icon, but would maybe have been better employed by relaying how much kinetic energy you've built up on each jump in some way. Also, without knowing for certain how to achieve better scores/how to turn into golden Vibri, it's tough to try and go for better scores.That's more a failing of my Japanese skills than a game fault, though.

Even knowing it backwards, however, wouldn't make the game brilliant. I think the joy is meant to come from the customisation element: the game supports a USB link to certain brands of cameras and mobiles, so that you can upload and edit your own pics. The box also says it's an online title, so one assumes you can potentially have an infinite supply of challenges created by people all over the world (well...probably just all over Japan. I'd say the likelihood of this getting a release/online support in the West is very slim). Like Ribbon, Ripple's strength would seem to lie in the customisation side of things. I'll give my camera a go in case it happens to work but, even if I do, lack of sharing images and my inability to use the Jpn-heavy edit function makes it redundant.

Ripple, to me, ought to live or die by how well people use the connectivity functions. As a standalone game, it's too basic and the music is frikking atrocious, making it tough to warm to. Ok to wile-away a few minutes, but I'm betting good use of external pics (use your imagination ) would add to the quality.

[Papercut]

Perfectly timed jumps increase the green bar on the right, and gives you a golden shower of stars (fnnr); a full bar transforms you into super vibri. The transofrmation is time limited though.

You don't need to be super vibri to stomp enemies, you just need to reach a certain jump height.

I think the rankings are purely score based, but it is possible to create some kind of multiplier. I haven't figured this out yet, but it might be based on combo-releasing items.

The Online aspects involve being able to pick up picture attachments from emails.

The music is beginning to grow on me too, but it is not in Ribbon's class.

[Treble]

Perfectly timed jumps increase the green bar on the right, and gives you a golden shower of stars (fnnr); a full bar transforms you into super vibri. The transofrmation is time limited though.

You don't need to be super vibri to stomp enemies, you just need to reach a certain jump height.

The purest, most distilled example of why everyone in the world is more observant than me

Cheers for that. I didn't spot the effects of the green bar mainly because I have to watch the canvas to time my jumps (again, due to lack of proper feedback from the game). You seem to be getting a lot more from it than me - I've been playing a lot of rhythm action recently, and this is pretty weak in comparison. Not awful mind, but pretty limited. A six-out-of-ten-er for me so far.

[martTM]

Picked it up today and... well, I like it. I never really played Ribbon, but this seems good, simple fun - balancing your time between collecting unecessary icons (for additional bonus points) and the ones you need to complete the stage is nice, although I'm still having trouble killing enemies other than when I'm golden. I like it - got it on a balance between wanting it and needing it for work though, which means there's a copy of Katamari Damacii still sitting on the shelf rather than being in my PS2. Bah.

[Papercut]

You can kill enemies when:

- super/golden vibri
- you've _just_ done a golden jump, ie. on the way back after timing a jump perfectly (golden stars as vibri jumps).

I've been playing this more today, it is a grower. Gets very addicitve as the difficulty ramps up.

You get an increased score for releasing more than one item at once, and a huge bonus if you complete an area with every item (the 'multiplier' I was thinking of). Getting the complete-item bonus is pretty much the only way to get gold rankings.

Some areas you have to save a required item till last, so that you can get all extras before triggering end-of-level (some required items are based on color alone).

[Mr Ono]

Vib Ripple got a very low mark in C&VG this month if that actually means anything.

[martTM]

I think you've pretty much answered your own point right there...

And damn you, Papercut - I've got this one down to a fine art now, so I thought I was going to be clever by posting all the points not made so far... and then you beat me to it. Bah.

Still... with 180 icons to discover (including the secret 'complete row' ones that appear to be super-special), I reckon I'll be on this for a while yet. Loving it so far though.

[Darwock]

If anybody can discover what phones and cameras are compatible, that'd be nice. Curse them for not including eyeToy support...

I never did work out the online portion of Mojib ribbon, but I thikn that's mainly because my PAL console doesn't pass DNAS.

[Trifle]

If anybody can discover what phones and cameras are compatible, that'd be nice.

Cameras:

http://www.playstation.jp/scej/title/vibripple/vr_cl_dc.html

Phones:

http://www.playstation.jp/scej/title/vibripple/vr_cl_cl.html

They're also listed on the back of the box AFAIR.

[Darwock]

Ehh... OK, I take it these phones can only be got in Japan? I see one that is obviously the same as a Sanyo phone over here, but jeez....

[martTM]

Forget phones - the cameras are the way to go. We've got a Sony T1 in the office... needles to say, we've had some fun bouncing on people's faces this afternoon. Thankfully, the level creation process is pretty simple, as the game does much of the work for you - and I'm guessing that once the system of sharing levels with people through the network adapter gets going, it'll be even more of a laugh. Effectively, it's the game that never stops giving in that sense... so how C&VG managed to totally miss the point, I'll never know.

[Kaladron]

Can anyone post tips on how to upload your own photos? I've tried with both a phone and a camera with no luck.

I click on the drum that says USB and all I get is a short japanese message and a prompt to press the circle button then...nothing. What am I doing wrong?

The phone is a Sharp GX30
The camera is a Canon Ixus Digital 300

I know the game has alist of compatible devices but surelt there are more that aren't listed?

[martTM]

I know the game has alist of compatible devices but surelt there are more that aren't listed?

Don't want to sound obvious, but... well, that's what the list is for. It's almost like saying that your Xbox games don't work in your PS2 - it says Xbox on the box, but surely it has to work on something else as well.

Seriously though, if it works then it's a piece of cake - plug in the camera and set it up to transmit via USB (which should be automatic, if it's anything like the T1 we've got), then choose the USB option on screen and that's it. We've uploaded a few pics... check out the review in the next issue and you should see what I mean.

[dave heats]

Forget phones - the cameras are the way to go. We've got a Sony T1 in the office... needles to say, we've had some fun bouncing on people's faces this afternoon.

hehehehehehehe.

I'm undecided whether to get this game or not. I can forsee it becoming fairly repetitive quite quickly.

[Kaladron]

Don't want to sound obvious, but... well, that's what the list is for. It's almost like saying that your Xbox games don't work in your PS2 - it says Xbox on the box, but surely it has to work on something else as well.

Seriously though, if it works then it's a piece of cake - plug in the camera and set it up to transmit via USB (which should be automatic, if it's anything like the T1 we've got), then choose the USB option on screen and that's it. We've uploaded a few pics... check out the review in the next issue and you should see what I mean.

Well it was worth a try. Guess I'll have to save up my Rupees to buy a fancy new camera.