Launchball

From the award-winning Preloaded design team (website) comes a new physics-based game designed for the Science Museum in London. Launchball is a fabulously produced take on the 'guide something to the goal' family of physics games.

For each level, you are given a limited set of movable blocks. The existing blocks on the level are, of course, immobile. Drag blocks from your inventory onto the level to place them. Besides the standard ramps and springs, there are many different types of blocks for your benefit (or detriment as the case may be). For example, there are fans and electromagnets to help get your ball moving. However, these require electricity, which may come from a number of different sources, including battery power, wind power, solar power, and geothermal power. And of course, the electricity has to get to these devices somehow. That's where the copper blocks come in. Copper also conducts heat.

One nice thing about Launchball is that all of the blocks snap to a grid, minimizing the fine-tuning that you'll have to do to complete some levels. However, the flip side of that coin is that the base levels are pretty easy (despite being titled Hard, Insane, and Beyond), which is understandable, considering the target demographics of most science museums. Many of the puzzles are a simple matter of placing the missing link back into a system, and often you are given more blocks than necessary to complete the puzzle.

But here's where user-designed puzzles come to the rescue! Yes, there is a level editor and you can send your levels to all your friends and submit them to the level database. Although the database is pretty small right now, once the traffic picks up it should become quite laden with challenging levels.

As for the style and production — it's Preloaded; need we say more? There's nice touches all over the place. Personally, I really dig the iconic block symbols and the soft but dissonant chords that accompany every collision. The physics seem a little damped at times, though in actuality they are probably more realistic (if less entertaining) than similar games. Play Launchball.

Note: The game has been only just gone live at the Science Museum website, and the folks at Preloaded tell us that they are still working on putting some finishing touches on the engine. Therefore, you may experience a bit of wonkiness as the last few issues are worked out with it. Also, please have patience as the servers begin to heat up with all the traffic they are quite likely to receive.