Child of Eden

In the swelling multiverses of augmented humans, xenomorphs and tech-heavy infantry that litter gaming's expectations of what the future could be like, Tetsuya Mizuguchi is entirely unique. A bold claim, but watch or play Child of Eden and you'll realise its a true one. There's simply no other game developer doing anything like this on the planet.

Turning digital spaces into malleable reality has already been attempted. Introversion's Darwinia conceptualised it as basic vector-style landscapes with viruses preying on docile Lemming-like programs. Tron envisioned it as neon-lit circuit board cityscapes, Jeff Bridges and "bio-digital jazz". Yet the only thing comparable to Q Entertainment's second blueprint of a future gone digital is it's first attempt eleven years ago with Rez. Child of Eden is truly unique - and it's good to know here uniqueness doesn't come at the sacrifice of beauty, or challenge.

But first, let's talk basics and build from there. Because it's hard to understand exactly what Child of Eden actually is on first glance, and harder still to explain exactly why its so much more than the shooter tag its landed with.

Child of Eden is a shoot 'em up, a strictly on-rails first-person shooter that guides you automatically through levels, with only the commands of camera pans and firing left to your control.

It's been built specifically in mind for motion-controllers. Here, Microsoft's Kinect, though a PlayStation Move version is due later this year. There is the choice to use a standard joypad, but the mechanics are the same; shoot enemies as they appear on screen until you eventually get to the end boss, destroy its multiple forms, finish, get your high score, collect your reward, and you're back to the menu screen. Repeat a few more times to unlock all the levels, then dig back in for Score Attack runs.

However, explaining it away as "just a shooter" is the same as categorising Mario as "just a platformer".

1999's Rez saw Mizuguchi-san first explore the idea of diving into a futuristic computer network via the medium of an on-rails shooter, each level evolving both in graphical and musical complexity as the player passed through checkpoints (or into deeper layers, if you will). Simple electronic beats grew naturally into pounding multi-layered dance tracks, and level design expanded from basic wire frameworks into visually-astonishing imagery that pulsed in time to the soundtrack. Audio from destroyed enemies merged into the fabric of the music as well - it was music visualiser meets videogame.

And even if you didn't have a musical bone in your body, Rez was a pretty hardcore shooter; moderately tough to finish, difficult to earn 100% completion rates for enemies downed, support items collected and such.

Child of Eden very much builds on that premise, but the intervening years has seen technology perhaps reach a point that it can nearly match whatever swirling synesthesia dreams are boiling within the Japanese developer's head.

The game looks incredible - a artistically pure vision, equal parts music video, digital zoo and tech demo. It's the latter that comes closest perhaps to summing up what's been achieved here; Child of Eden looks like those impressive tech demos you've seen through the years but never been able to touch or play with; surrealist flights of fancy built entirely on the whim of their creator.

Each level builds on a core idea, such as vegetation or industrialisation. Blue pulsing plant roots give way to lily gardens and monstrously-sized butterflies, abstract cogs become locomotives, then rockets; each level is characteristically distinct from its brethren.

You're given a fairly abstract explanation as to the situation. Lumi, a computer AI (who also doubles as the virtual face of Mizuguchi's band Genki Rockets) has been infected with a virus within its network. You're charged to dive in, clear the cyberspace of the virus like a Norton version of Mr.Muscle, and thus save Lumi in the process. It might sound cobblers, but it does gives you an understanding as to why, when you're carving chunks of a boss's energy bar you occasionally see the flash of some girl's face. The net may be vast and infinite, but it's still save the princess time.

Spearheading the second wave of Kinect titles, Child of Eden finally lays to rest any issue of hardware lag; there simply isn't any to be found (or its so small its not noticeable), suggesting any prior problems have been through unfamiliarity developing with the controller.

There's even an option to speed the targeting reticule, your point of interaction with anything in Child of Eden, to near-Ninja levels. Hovering over the circular option menus selects them in a matter of seconds, rather than the now-seemingly prolonged loads of the Kinect Guide. If you've had Kinect a while, the first time you try Child of Eden, you'll be amazed. After a while, you'll wonder why everything else isn't this graceful.

During levels, motion control is simple and intuitive, for the most part. Stand with right arm raised, palm spread and you can trace a lock-on reticule over multiple enemies, then flick your hand to fire (maxing out your lock-ons aids your scoe multipliers). Drop your right and raise your left to use a continuous rapid-fire shot, which while weaker, is the only way to destroy any projectiles fired towards you. These are indicated by a glowing purple hue, and incoming barrages are highlighted with a subtle purple ring around the screen, with markers on it pointing out the direction of each individual missile. You don't dodge attacks, but defend.

'Euphoria' attacks - firework-like smart bombs - are triggered by throwing both hands up in the air. You can stock a few of these at a time, and they appear as collectables during levels as glowing purple balls. On a similar note, your multi-sectioned health bar, at the bottom-right of the screen if you choose to have the full HUD on (there's an option to go HUD-nude if you wish), is chipped away with each attack, and can be restored with glowing blue balls which are few and far between during run-throughs.

The system isn't without its problems, due to a combination of Kinect registering limbs as you move, and the camera. In Rez, you could only move the camera slightly at the edges of your vision, and at that, it was done only by expert players preemptively lining up the next set enemy attack patterns.

In Child of Eden, pulling and holding the reticule anywhere along the screen's edge for slightly longer than a heartbeat will pan you, at times, nearly 80 degrees further. In some sections this is crucial to spot enemies floating alongside you and increase your score.

However, its an issue when you're slower in dropping and switching between hands. Tiredness is a natural state after playing the game for a while, but if you don't snap your hands down by your side with regimental quickness, Kinect will continue to track your dropping hand for a few extra crucial seconds, dragging the targeting reticule down and thus pan the camera away as a result.

Likewise when activating Euphoria, anything slower than a blink will see the camera spiral upwards as it tracks your current hand before firing the smart bomb as it finally registers both second hand and action implied. Even if it happens once, this error is enough to make it more hindrance than tactical advantage come boss encounters. When everything else is so flawless, this is feet-stompingly annoying.
One boss battle, in which you have to track it back and forth as it flies past, under and over you repeatedly, serves as perfect example of these problems.

Of course, you can use a standard joypad. But even with that, you're unlikely to unlock every level on your first, even second run-through.

Scores accumulate Star ratings, which double as currency to open up the next sequence. Playing through the third level with the controller the first time, we still scored lower on Stars than with Kinect. While the game tracks two different scoreboards for each level, one for each control method, a check with Ubisoft revealed that the scoring system is quite different for each - joypad controls needing nearly double the score as Kinect's to earn the same number of stars.

This is far from a suggestion that Kinect is far less precise than the standard controller, but more an acknowledgement that an analog stick and buttons can be quicker off the mark. Look at it this way - if you've got the option of both, then you've effectively got two variations of the game to work through.

Boss battles that end each level might go on a mite too long, but the eye-boggling spectacle and artistry with each never looses its edge.

They're leviathans all, and memorable for the right reasons (prior example included). One pitched battle sees you against a mutating giant, first taking form as a massive whale swimming along a virtual ocean floor as you circle around its bulk, and turning into a flaming phoenix as it soars off-world into the heavens above.

Another boss fight is a more literal interpretation of music meets game; a multi-sided monster that projects multiple checkered boards, with purple and red points flashing across each in time to the music.

Yet another offers a nod to the Running Man boss of Rez, in its place two titanic runners that require you to switch hands to defend specific colour attacks so swiftly it touches on Ikaruga at times.

Each level impresses, visually, musically. But unlike its spiritual predecessor, the sense of frantic escalation that is the bedrock of the shooting genre isn't immediately apparent in Child of Eden.

The visuals can be overpowering at first; the opening trio of levels the pacing seems slower, more relaxed even, lacking that gradual build of difficulty cued in by diving deeper into the network with each checkpoint.

And at that, you only really notice the issue come your exhaustive first run-through of the fourth level and you're fighting to get your heart-rate back to normal. Only then do you realise the game hasn't broken you into a sweat yet, hasn't really tested your reflexes.

It could simply be because the music selection varies much more in Child of Eden, offering serene tracks alongside the pulsing frantic beats of Rez, and as a result, the game's descent into panic-enducing bullet storms is much more gradual.

Perhaps because the visuals are so expressive from the off, the growing complexity between basic opening and level climax isn't quite so apparent. And maybe we're unfairly comparing Q's last effort with its newest, and looking for something that wasn't part of the design in the first place. As a gameplay experience we think Rez just pips this. But then that's like saying that the Beatles are better than the Rolling Stones. Both are still undeniable classics.

Microsoft's motion-control really creates a different experience, and with a good surround sound system, Child of Eden is the showcase for Kinect, a wholly-immersive experience that has no equal. At this point it's hard to see anything that will come close to matching it. Even friends not interested in score boards can enjoy diving in with a damage-free mode that can be unlocked.

Do you miss out if you haven't got Kinect? We won't say so. For controller types, there's as much to enjoy, but do yourself a favour and shell out for a good pair of headphones for the proper level of immersion needed.

The main bone of contention really is price versus content. Aside from an art gallery, videos, as well selecting a new Eden creature from the game to join your menu collection every time you finish a level, the main meat of the game doesn't seem substantial enough for forty quid.

We're always aware now that we're in a digital age were larger games are now available for a quarter of that price. Child of Eden's five levels weigh in and around a quarter of an hour apiece. You'll likely need a few run-throughs to survive each level, learn the tricks; but that's still roughly an hour and a quarter of playtime. That's about the same as a music album.

But music albums aren't there to be played continuously, on unlimited repeat until your brain's fried or your ears fed up. The very best are to be listened to sparingly. Savoured, treasured. To be placed loving on a shelf in your prized collection, and enjoyed anew for some time to come. They'll always sound fresh every time you give them a listen.

For a man who's life and work is so obviously entwined with music, the metaphor is fitting for Child of Eden. It's not perfect; the camera issues are aggravating, and there could have been more included the package. Will this be a title you pull out ten, even five years from now and it have the same impact? The rules of the game change so swiftly these days it's hard to say. But treat it right, and likely this game will last you throughout the rest of this generation at least, and linger in your memory much longer. It'll always be remembered as something new, special. Unique.

And even if the music and visuals don't enrich you personally? It's important to at least experience this. If anything, to prove to your jaded self that there's much more to gaming still than bullets and kill-streaks.