I never thought you could make an arcade game out of those moveable marble puzzles. You know the ones, you move them to make the ball roll into the hole. But then I played Lazy Raiders, a game so simple in design yet so deep in practice.
You take control of Doctor Diggabone, or if you prefer, your Xbox avatar. Watching my little ginger bearded explorer run around was a fun experience, especially when the game allows you to dress your actual avatar up the same with some generous avatar awards. The levels themselves, and the traps and tricks within them, match the look of the characters: simple, bright and friendly. It looks very smart even though graphics are not the driving force behind the game, it’s all about the puzzles of course.
The first few levels are quite easy in premise but hard until you get some experience in controlling the different moving parts. You move the level with the analogue sticks, and the option of pressing A to flip it, to guide your character around and reach the keys that unlock the doors. Once you unlock all the doors then you can grab the golden pick and complete the level, although there are countless gems and idols to collect as well. At the end of the level you are rewarded money for how well you have done, relating to the amount of gems and idols collected, amount of traps destroyed, damage taken and time completed. After each set of levels you have what can only be described as a boss level, where there is a thief, and you have to stop him from grabbing the artefact first. These levels are very tricky as you move the thief as well as yourself, not bothersome at first but in the later levels they become quite hard.
With 75 levels in the game, it quickly starts ramping up the difficulty by giving you more and more traps and enemies to deal with, requiring a ridiculously high level of concentration. Spiked walls stop you going one way, but you can use the rolling rock to smash through the spikes and clear the way; the same with spiked pits, roll the rock into them to smash the spikes and fill the pit. The trouble comes from the control system, as when you move the level to roll the rock you also roll the same way, often resulting in smashing the spikes and your little avatar.
These simple traps are built upon in a variety of different ways, whether working alongside other items or just placed in the most irksome of places. Some of the most creative uses are in the artic levels, where the snow and ice are used for the traps; rolling boulders are replaced by snow balls that get larger as they roll across piles of snow; roll the ball over icicles and it turns into a spiky snowball; if the snowball is getting too big then smash it off the walls to reduce its size; all very clever, and helps to keep the game fresh. Throw in flame traps and TNT barrels, bats that turn into blue balls when you flip the map and you can see how there is enough variety to last the 75 levels.
The game, like any good puzzler, is frustrating; but the fact that you do not die, as such, helps keep you plodding through the tricky levels. It’s just that getting hit costs you money, and for some reason that I cannot fathom, that annoys me – which is a good testament to the game, as I care about getting gold medals, not those lowly silver ones. The control system is reasonably foolproof, offering no major problems but it can make some acute movements very tricky. To avoid some traps, or even to collect that last shiny little gem, you have to roll into a small area, but getting in there can be so stupidly annoying that it destroys all the fun you are actually having. But, as I said, the controls do handle well, all the better when you play the game more and work your way through it.
Lazy Raider is a game that grew on me with time, seeming a little clumsy at first but quickly becoming an addictive time-eater. If you too can give it the time and learn it’s confusing little movements then it will reward you, and with tons of collectibles and times to beat, it definitely has some serious replay value.
VideogameUK verdict: 7/10
