Should classic arcade games be treated like this or given the decent treatment they deserve?
I am a firm fan of retro gaming. Pixels to where we are now is a bit like Blues helping to lead to Rock and Roll, in that you need one and need to respect it to get to the other. Q-Bert is almost like the Marmite of old school games, in that you either loved it or hated it. I actually didn't mind it, to be honest. Alright the joystick controls were difficult when you were in the arcade, but when it hit home consoles you found it more forgiving. Either way though I enjoyed the original...
What I DON'T enjoy though is this drivel that has been made in the name of poor Q-Bert. I mean he hasn't had much luck in the way of things. I mean he starred in that AWFUL pixels movie (and still showed up Adam Sandler) so things haven't been great for him, but this modern take on his original game is a joke. The graphics are touched up and are sharp enough, but everything else just screams of something you would download onto a tablet or a phone for a quick 5 minute play and NOT on a gaming console hooked up to your 55 inch television to enjoy a blast of what you used to like.
Everything about the new version is just tacky and rubbish. The music sounds like something from a bad rave party from 2000 and all the gimmicks that are bolted on just feel like filler, like being able to choose what your character looks like, obviously by collecting coins to afford the purchase, but you'll not even get that far in the first place. That is a simple promise I make to you because you will need a love of old games that almost borders on STALKING to get enjoyment out of the modern take on this.
What they've done with it is turn it into a more obvious puzzle game, adding little changes as you go on, but what absolutely ruins it is the change to the controls. Instead of just simply pointing the stick and heading on your merry way you now have to highlight the block ahead and press the A button to make him jump. This may sound incredibly petty, but you should try playing it and then you will see just how much this ruins the gameplay compared to what there used to be with the classic arcade title.
Everything outside of the arcade port scrams cheap and nasty and that is more or less what you end up with. This should not be on anyone's machine, at least not as a solo title. The ONLY thing that saves it is that you get both versions to play with, but to be honest you will only want to ever go back to one of them and it isn't the newer incarnation.
I seriously wish they would take some time and consideration when remaking arcade games, even the "almost" classics like Q-Bert here, instead of making a mockery of their name and heritage by giving us this crap. it is almost sickening. It would be a bit like having a Led Zeppelin song and then 20 years later doing a cover version from The Thompson Twins. It just doesn't work. If you can find another way to play Q-Bert then do that and leave this guff well alone, as it is worth revisiting the classics, rather than taking the piss out of them.
Thanks to the Xbox Community for allowing us to review the game.