Well, well, well. Electroplankton is a fun musical experiment that Nintendo released on the DS. However, it was really unpopular, probably due to the bad reviews and lack of advertism. Nintendo tried to boost its popularity by adding the Hanenbow stage as an actual stage in Super Smash Bros. Brawl, and, wow, lots of people searched for the game.
Recently, Nintendo has put up the game on the DSi shop, each individual level as its own download, making it a long process just to actually own the game. The good news of this over the original DS release is that it’s on the system itself, which is great for just whipping out a nice melody. Otherwise, it’s a bit annoying having an extra screen picking the (only one) creature, which had all the creatures in the original version. Instead, you just have to go back to the DSi menu and pick the next one.
Anyways, Electroplankton is a musical experience game. It’s not as much a game as of just a fun little tool to use. Each creature has its own way of playing, and each seems to do a different experience. Some of them are good, and some are bad. Each one has a performance mode (where you play around with it), and an audience mode (where the game plays it for you). I’ll review each one, and tell you how each one is, just so that you can pick which ones to get.
The first one is Trapy. Trapy requires you to drag a path for the Trapys to swim through. Moving the line higher will produce a high note, and a low line indicates a low line. All of the creatures can slow down and speed up their tempos if you like. This creature doesn’t sound to great though. The six Trapys will repeat their paths constantly, and it sounds really messed and muddled up. The audience mode will introduce a circle of all of the Trapys, slow it down, and then speed up to a sudden finish. Really dramatic and traumatic. Drawing the line quickly will make Trapy swim quickly and vice versa. It’s not really the greatest one but you can make it sound cool slowly. Otherwise, it has too much dissonance.
Number 2 is Hanenbow. Any Brawl players would already know this. Hanenbow get fired out of a leaf and bounce off of the other leaves to make notes. You can change the angle of all the leaves to change where the Hanenbow go. Pressing A will bring up the angles of the leaves (for perfection things). I really like this one, because the notes that are played are always repeated, and it sounds quite natural, like a 3-year old playing on a xylophone. It’s really fun just trying to make a great melody going on, and overall, this is a must have one. It’s great to listen to. No wonder there’s a Brawl stage.
For 3 is Luminarrow. These creatures will follow the direction that the arrow they’re on is facing. Differnt spots play differnt notes, and each Luminarrow plays a different octave. This creates a bassline, melodies, and harmonies. If you can get it right, you can make a great sounding song. Tapping an arrow will change its direction, and that can mean you can change the melodies played. It’s great sounding if you can pull it off. Listening to the audience mode is great too. This one’s a plus.
For 4, is Sun-Animalcule. Weird. Anyway, this one’s a bad one in my opinion. You tap the screen to places the creatures, and they make sounds as they hatch their eggs. It’s too hard to make a good sounding environment though, as the notes start to contrast after playing too much. For some odd reason, the audience mode can pull it off well. That’s weird. Other than that, they get bigger as time goes past, so they’ll just full up the screen. Weird as well. Then they’ll pop. Ouch.
Friendly five is Rec-Rec. This one has four Rec-Recs, that you can tap to record a voice recording to the beat of the song. They’ll constantly play to the drumline playing, and it’ll create a good song. I like this one, as all the melodies are your’s so it’s your fault if it sounds bad. Also, speeding the thing up and slowing it down ius fun to do. Very, very fun. I really like this one. Audience mode’s barking dog and hissing cat aren’t entirely company, but performing is very, very fun.
Super six is Nanocarp. This one has several Nanocarps on the screen. Singing, or clapping will move them into poses, and you can then tap on the screen or use the D-Pad to create ripples to make nice sounds. It does take an instruction manual to understand, but it does work. Clapping faster will change what they pose to. It sounds like a chime, and it makes a great outdoor noise. Not much to say, but I recommend this one.
Secret seven for Lumiloop. These donut shaped Electroplankton play pentatonic notes when you spin them, created a soft ambient hum. Sometimes, you just feel like sleeping to this kind of music because it is so relaxing. It doesn’t sound bad at all. It’s just not eventful. It’s basically just 5 notes that can fade in when you’re playing them. A great one, I really like this one. Awesome.
8=Marine-Crystals. These guys are all on the screen, and tapping each one plays notes, which you can make a cool piano song with it, usually a minor song. I like this one, although it’s hard to know what you’re going to press. However, the audience mode can pull this off as well. Not much to say, but the songs you could make are easy and cool sounding. Someone should record some of this…
Number 9 is Beatnes. Split it up, Beat-NES. That’s right. Your favourite 8-bit beat with your favourite sound effects on top of it. Tap the creatures to play the sound effects. There are also scales that you can play melodies. It’s just an awesome tool just to play all of these great sound effects. It’s just very fun. The starman tune with several Mario sound effects is an awesome idea. Along with Wrecking Crew, Kid Icarus, and…Baseball? Or is it some F1 racing game? I don’t know!
Last and possibly least, Varvoice. This one’s just a thrown in mess. You just record a message you say, and tap the different shapes of Varvoice to change how the recording sounds like. This one’s got practically nothing. It’s not really soothing, or even music. It’s just your voice in a weird way. It’s not really good for the theme, and messes up the thing.
In the end, if you’ve got a DSi, you only need about half of these. However, DS owners have to buy all of it at once. Oh well. It’s a great experience to have. The music you make is great, and overall, I really like just keeping it on and just listening to the great melody I just created.
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