The Digest: After some Dragon Aging and Mass Effecting, you just want to play a game that lets you relax and Tunescape does just that.  The simplistic and engaging game play makes this one Indie game that’s hard to put down.

The Fact Sheet

Release Date: April 2nd, 2010
Developer: ladron
Platform: Xbox LIVE® Indie Games
Genre: Music
Price: 80 MS Points

PRODUCT OVERVIEW:
Music-generated gameplay meets physics-based interaction. Fly through a colorful, music-driven environment and try to collect the Tune Fragments. But beware of Meteors and Black Holes! Play solo or multiplayer with the included progression of music or against any song your own music library.

Tunescape starts off with a great tutorial that explains everything you need to know.  You take control of a neon purple orb with the left thumb stick and your objective is to collect as many colored fragments as possible before the song ends which in turn, ends that particular stage.  Although Tunescape has its own soundtrack, you can use any music downloaded to your Xbox 360 hard drive.  I wasn’t expecting a feature like this in an Indie Game but, what a welcomed feature this is.

There are 3 colored items for you to collect and each has their own perk.  Collecting Green objects give you a speed boost, blue fragments give you a gravity pulse which pulls the fragments towards you, and yellow fragments give you a shield. The fourth power up is an orange star which is a score multiplier. Given that the yellow fragments provide a shield means that you’ll need to defend yourself (and that you will).  You’ll need to avoid the red meteors, as colliding with them will cause you to lose stars.  Black holes may also provide a bit of an obstacle as they pull everything, including you, toward them.   The amount in which the colored fragments are released is dependent on the beat of the song so there might be times where fragments are scare but, once the beat picks up, fragments come at you in bursts.

You initially start off with two stages and in order to unlock all the stages in the game, you’ll have to achieve high scores in each stage.  Achieving a score of 2,500 points earns you a diamond, a score of 7,500 gets you a second diamond and a score of 12,000 earns you a third diamond.  This is probably what will make you keep coming back to play Tunescape just because you’ll want to beat your high score.

Tunescape can also be played multiplayer either in co-op or competitively with up to 4 players which I personally enjoyed doing with my kids.  The game’s look is simple and colorful which suits the feel of everything fine.  I wasn’t expecting a feature like this in an Indie Game but, what a welcomed feature this is.

Conclusion: Tunescape doesn’t do anything I haven’t already seen before. However, with such a low price point, addicting replay value, and the fact that you can import your own music from your hard drive, it’s truly music to my ears.

Single Player: 4/5 | Multi-Player: 4/5

Special thanks to No Static Software for providing us with a copy of the game for review.