Let’s Tap Hands-on Preview

Human sacrifice, dogs and cats living together, mass hysteria! SEGA is publishing what it claims to be the world’s first controller-less video game, a product where the player’s only input is to tap on the top of a cardboard box. In the minds of pessimistic gamers, this is surely the final sign that casual gaming has taken over our humble hobby. We’re all doomed, I tells ya. Doomed!

But hold up one second. Don’t enter your nuclear fallout shelter just yet, because there’s another surprise on the horizon: Let’s Tap is really good. It’s hard to imagine that a collection of tap-controlled mini-games could be anything other than a lightweight gimmick, but somehow Japanese developer Prope has succeeded in creating something fun, fresh and genuinely original. Then again, perhaps we shouldn’t be so surprised, because Prope is the indie studio that was recently formed by Yuji Naka – the creator of Sonic the Hedgehog and Nights Into Dreams, among other gems.

Let’s Tap offers up five very different mini-games, each of them controlled using nothing more than simple tapping motions. While the Wii remote can be used in standard fashion to navigate menus, each game requires players to place their controller face-down on some form of flat surface that will easily transmit vibrations. At SEGA’s recent preview event all the journalists were given boxes of tissues, and that seemed to be the perfect choice: if you get a bit upset after an embarrassing loss then you’ll have something you can use to wipe the tears from your eyes. And if you win and get over-excited, you could… well, you get the idea.

The first of the two mini-games on display was Tap Runner, a simple racing game for up to four players. Each participant controls a coloured stick man as he jogs across a futuristic assault course, drawn in a simple yet rather natty style that resembles the ’80s film Tron. Getting your little chap to run is a matter of keeping up a steady rhythm of light taps. The faster you go the faster he’ll move, while a single hard tap will cause your man to jump. That’s pretty much it as far as player input goes, but each level is littered with features that require you to swiftly adapt your pace or timing. There are electrical fields that must be carefully hopped over, tightropes that require the gentlest of taps, and strange aerial turbo pads that send your man rocketing through the air. There are big slides, and balloons that must be inflated to progress, and all of these things help to make each race a chaotically entertaining contest.

There’s something about Tap Runner that makes people extremely competitive. It’s hard to know exactly why this is the case, but the game certainly benefits as a result. The controls may be simple but it’s surprisingly easy to make a mistake, allowing one of your bitter rivals to take the lead. As one racer gains a lead the camera pulls back to give a wider view of the track, and this allows for some truly humiliating victories as some poor loser gets left behind everyone else. And because each race only lasts a few minutes, there’s always time for “one more round”, for a chance to get revenge on your mates. In a group of four, it’s highly addictive stuff.

The second game demoed by SEGA was Silent Blocks – a puzzle challenge that plays a bit like Jenga spliced with Columns. There are actually several different modes to try out here, but I spent most of the afternoon playing Alchemy. Here everyone is presented with a tower made up of red and blue blocks. A selection tool slowly moves up and down the stack; when it hovers over the block you wish to manipulate, you tap your box once. You then get another tool to determine the direction in which you wish to pull, then you tug your block from the stack by drumming your fingers. The rest of the tower will slip about depending on how gentle you are with your movements, and if you’re not careful you’ll send the entire thing crashing down. Lining up three blocks of the same colour will cause them to change into something more valuable: three standard units will make a bronze block, three bronzes will make a silver one, and so forth.

At the simplest level of Alchemy you can race your opponents to see who can make the first gold block, but at higher difficulties the game can become seriously demanding. The longer you play, the bigger and more complicated your stack becomes – and the greater the likelihood that you’ll accidentally knock the whole thing over. Long matches can therefore become surprisingly tense as you attempt to out-pace your rivals without becoming too sloppy. Silent Blocks may lack the instant fun factor of Tap Runner but it seems to be a deeper game, and it’s certainly very playable. It will be interesting to explore the full extent of the other variations: one seemed to be a kind of infinite mode where anyone can try to remove a block, with play continuing until the tower is toppled. This seems like a smart inclusion, since it’s precisely the kind of activity that gets the Wii wheeled out at parties.

On the basis of what I’ve already played, I’d say that Let’s Tap will be good enough to merit serious attention from any Wii owner. Tap Runner and Silent Blocks are already top class, and the full release will also feature three other games. Rhythm Tap looks to be a fairly self-explanatory music game, while Visualiser seems to be a rather cool-looking set of interactive pictures: you can cause ripples in the surface of a fish pond, shoot fireworks across a city skyline, or cause paint to swirl across a canvas. There’s also a basic shoot-em-up called Bubble Voyager, where you have to guide you character through an underwater minefield. It’s not clear how this will work, but I’m guessing that you drum your fingers to control your altitude and hard-tap to fire.

At any rate, it says quite a lot that I’m now dead keen to try out the rest of Let’s Tap’s mini-games. While I doubt it will turn out to be as iconic as Sonic or Nights, it seems like Naka-san has once again delivered a winner. It’s original, it’s stylish and it’s very playable. I don’t know about you, but I’m picking up good vibrations.

Let’s Tap will be released on Wii this summer.