New to Xbox One, Inside My Radio is a game where Guitar Hero meets Donkey Kong. You “journey as a green LED mysteriously trapped inside a dying boombox,” says the description. With music at its heart, IMR’s ultimate aim is to “bring electro, dub and disco music back to life!”
That’s the sort of campaign I can get behind!
Inside My Radio was released on Steam back in June and became available for Xbox gamers today.
Where screenshots might suggest a standard left-to-right platform game template, IMR steps into promising and unconventional territory.
Beyond finding your path to the level exit by avoiding obstacles, using the walls in a ‘Parkour’ way through momentary stickiness to maintain a climb or navigating and even influencing sequences of moving platforms, progress comes by ensuring every move you make is timed with a beat of the evolving background music. Noire Blue’s walk-through video demonstrates the Inside My Radio way nicely…
Your power as a player comes in developing an ability to work to the soundtrack’s timing. Each synchronisation will fuel your jumps, give you a dash to traverse gaps between platforms and along with the slam, break obstructing walls.
Enough theory…
Though based on very good ideas, I didn’t find the game quite as enjoyable as I’d hoped.
Initially plenty of fun, both the gameplay and the music started to get a bit repetitive all too quickly. The only thing keeping me interested in IMR was the occasional mini-games – the Guitar Hero-like game shown during the slideshow below, for example.
A further positive about Inside My Radio is that it became a game my girlfriend was able to play. Video games most definitely are not her strong point, so that kept her happy! Reservations about repetition aside, it did likewise keep me entertained whilst I waited for Forza Motorsport 5 to update!
Bored clever…
I’m not denying the fact that Inside My Radio has some smart ideas and is even an inventive game – I just got bored of it quite quickly. It’s a shame really, because as I have said, the mini-games are rather enjoyable and making the game easy on the eye, the use of colours and effects is excellent. Another pleasing touch whose value will vary with the player is the wide use of visual and text-based pop culture references. As can only be expected, they’ll be ‘hit or miss’ depending on whether they have any meaning to you, but they are an amusing inclusion nonetheless.
If you are a fan of platform games, this one will potentially be highly enjoyable for you. It has all of the elements of a classic platformer and is boosted by that musical twist and lively characterisation. As a lover of music, I thought Inside My Radio would be right up my street, but I guess platform games just aren’t for me.
I think I’ll give it a 6 out of 10, but by all means, do give it a try – and if you do, let us know what you think!
Seaven Studios’ Inside My Radio launches as a digital release for Xbox One today.
Update: IMR is now listed on the Xbox Store with a price of £11.99 and a 1.15GB storage requirement.
It is also available on Steam in Standard and Digital Deluxe Edition form for £10.99 and £13.99 respectively. The Digital Deluxe Edition includes the game soundtrack.