My girlfriend Steff is really good at Bop It. I should further qualify that statement by saying that Steff is not 8 years old. All kidding aside, it was one of her favourite toys growing up and she’s still good at it today. Having used a Bop It in the last few months, I’m lucky if I can score 40, while she can hit 100 in her sleep.
Being the loving boyfriend that I am, I gifted her Bop It on the iPhone shortly after it came out. Did it meet my Bop It champion’s standards?
I was very curious to see how the toy would translate to the iPhone. Much of what made the toy cool was the fact that you were physically interacting with the ‘Bopjects’, which could be anything from hitting buttons, twisting knobs or pulling switches.
Though the iPhone doesn’t come with twisty knobs or cranks, the iPhone version does feature 12 ‘Bopjects’, which all come from various real-life Bop It toys. By using the touch screen, motion sensor and microphone, the game actually does a serviceable job of simulating the ‘Bopjects’. Everything from swiping the screen to “Pull it”, to shaking your phone like a miraca works as you would expect. Though the the tactile feel of twisting a knob isn’t necessarily there, the controls don’t take away from the Bop It action.
The premise of the main Bop It mode is still the same as the toy. Your job is to successfully complete the instructed task within a very short time period. As you progress, the commands come quicker and your timing window shrinks even further. While the toy simply asks you to complete the task and scoring you based on the number of tasks you complete, the iPhone game adds a rhythm element to the proceedings. There’s an additional scoring system that rewards you for executing your actions to the rhythm of the beat. For me, this made the game a lot more interesting, as it opens the door for you to more consistently meet or exceed your high score.
So what does Steff think? She likes it. It’s by no means a mind-blowing experience, but it’s about as fun as the toy. If that doesn’t sound like something you only would have found enjoyable when you were 8 years old, I can respect that. But if you have a kid that likes to use you’re phone or you’re looking for a simple and fun game to play in short spurts, Bop It is cool for what it is.
It’s also worth noting that Steff kicks my butt at the iPhone version, too. Real hard.
In Third Person 