xbox live indie game reviews

Hieronymous Bash is a whimsical little dodgeball game loosely based on the paintings of Hieronymus Bosch (you can read the Wikipedia link--I knew it was a name but had no idea who it was)--the weird half-man-half-table thing on the title screen is from his most famous work, The Garden of Earthly Delights. As typing 'Hieronymus' really sucks, the game will heretofore be referred to as HB. When it first came across my email, my first reaction was simple: "Not another damned pong clone." I filed it away for sometime later and went on to playing cooler sounding games (dodgeball? really?).

Now I wish I hadn't. The game might be damned (har har), but it's not another pong clone. You play as either a cute little angel or a cute little demon in one of many platformer-like levels based on heaven (lots of clouds) or hell (lots of flames). Besides running and jumping, you can hold 'A' to flap your little wings and effectively hover at one altitude. Sprinkled around the map are several holy dodgeballs. You pick one up with the right trigger and throw it by pressing the trigger again (it will throw in the direction of the left stick).

I thought it was a good choice to use the left stick for both movement and targeting instead of splitting it out to use the left stick for movement and the right stick for aiming--that makes the game feel a lot simpler (or more "classic") and more accessible to younger audiences (and my girlfriend). Each time you nail an opponent, your character gets a little bigger (making you an easier target). After a certain point, you level up to the point where your next dodgeball is lethal--but only for one shot. If you hit someone, they're dead (though they can keep playing as an annoying ghost). If you miss, you deflate back down to a pint-sized angel/demon.

The graphics and sound effects are cute as hell (and heaven), the music is great, and overall the game is pretty fun to play with other people (the AIs are a little dodgy). At only 200 points, I think HB is worth picking up as a cute little party game or a nice game for the younger folks in the house (assuming you have no problem with the heaven and hell stylings). I also love the fact that all the menus and options are written on banners that are flown in by the angels and demons--nice little touches like this are indicative of the overall polish for the whole game. Worth the points!