Tales from Space: Mutant Blob Attack Review

As soon as I’d read the title Mutant Blob Attack, my expectations of fun for this game were pretty high. And as I’d hoped the game play is as sold: you’re a mutant blob and you attack. Pretty much everything.

Tales from Space: Mutant Blob Attack is the sequel to Tales from Space: About a Blob. Indie developers Drinkbox released Mutant Blob Attack on Vita in 2011 as a launch title and it got an enthusiastic response from reviewers and fans. In a plan to make the game bigger and better, they have now released Mutant Blob Attack on Xbox and Ps3 as a D-pad friendly edition. When this sequel picks up the Blob race are googly-eyed captives in a university laboratory, tested but mostly just tortured in a Cartoon Network-like intro until the eponymous Blob escapes. The game is structured like an interactive cartoon and has just enough plot that right away you’re rooting for the little green hero when it sets out on a mission to rescue the other Blobs and generally to cause mayhem across twenty four levels

As with all of the best side-scrolling platform games, Mutant Blob Attack has two essential ingredients: fast pace and something addictive. I completed the game in two days but depending on how much of a perfectionist you are about collecting gems and rescuing the Blobs, you could easily keep repeating levels until you get a perfect score – and a respectable place on the online leader board.

As the mutant blob, you progress through segments of a level by eating enough stuff to get big enough to eat other stuff that is blocking your route to the next segment. As well as rescuing your buddies, there are gems to collect and obstacles to dodge, outrun, move and squeeze past using the mutantpowers that you gain as you progress. However what made this game stand out to me were the problem-solving challenges which slowed the pace down and got me thinking. They were all different, and a well-thought out way to add another element to an action side-scroller with an otherwise simple objective of eating everything you can. Frequent respawn points are well-placed just before these puzzles to keep the pace up, meaning I didn’t even get bored of being repeatedly splattered by the lasers.

The design of Mutant Blob Attacks is sharp and memorable, inspired by 50’s art and music and B-movie inspired horror, and deserves a separate mention. It’s easy to believe that if this game was released fifteen years ago, it’d be remembered and with fond 90s nostalgia for its gameplay and the little background touches like the Hipster Juice that it does so well. The bonus stages on the PS3 version makes good use of the controller’s sensor technology and are done in the style of classic games like table tilting ball, or mini-levels inspired by classic handheld games.

Mutant Blob Attack has something a bit different and new to do on every level, and it’s definitely a fun way to pass a few hours. Because it’s just so easy to play and to like, I got to the end wondering where all the levels had gone, tempted to go back and beat my own score. If I had to pick something that disappointed me, it was that there weren’t more levels but it’s one of those games you’ll want to pick up again when you have a few spare minutes or even just as some light relief from bigger titles, and I’m hoping that Mutant Blob Attack is the second in at the very least a trilogy from Drinkbox.

REVIEW CODE: A complimentary Sony Playstation 3 code was provided to Brash Games for this review. Please send all review code enquiries to editor@brashgames.co.uk.