Run, but no gun

There may not be the huge numbers of incoming WiiWare titles we've seen in the past, but we'll take quality over quantity any day. One of the more interesting titles coming to WiiWare is Object Vision's Aya and the Cubes of Light, a puzzle platformer that's quite unlike anything on the service so far.

As you might expect, Aya's levels are cubic in nature, suspended in space by some strange force. Like a giant Rubik's cube, you must master all sides to complete the stage, with carefully plotted paths across the six faces requiring accurate jumping and smart puzzle-solving to proceed. Unlike Super Mario Galaxy for example, should you fall off the edge of the cube you lose a life, but you can walk safely from face to face if you find the right route, preventing players from leaping around recklessly.

The game's biggest feature is its use of gravity: run up the side of a wall and the gravity changes accordingly, letting you walk across ceilings and down vertical inclines where ramps are available. Sounds straightforward, but things get tricky when you realise you have to jump "up" the level to proceed, forcing you to plot a route across each face to get where you need to go. It's devious stuff, but makes the most of the game's small levels.

Levels can get complex.

In this preview version, the controls leave a little to be desired: you flick the Remote to jump when we would have preferred a simple button-press, and while the gesture required to active the end-of-level transporter is reliable it feels an unnecessary admission, as though the developer felt compelled to add motion controls to a game that really doesn't need them.

From our hands-on time with the game so far, we can say Aya and the Cubes of Light is an intriguing addition to the WiiWare library. It may not be as polished as some games on the service, and its motion controls won't please everyone, but it's got some clever level design and will give your grey matter a work out.

Aya and the Cubes of Light is due for release in North America on 30th June. We'll have a full review shortly after its release.