Off the Wall

"They stab it with their steely knives, but they just can't kill the beast..."

What challenges have you had to overcome during your life? Did you make an attempt at getting perfect grades on your report cards? Did it involve learning how to drive? Were you trying to find a decent job in a dead economy? How about living in a country without knowing the language? Have you ever climbed a mountain just to see the astounding view? Life is full of challenges and obstacles, each one waiting patiently for some individual to approach them. Sometimes it'll involve some sort of social right of passage, while other times it'll end up a choice between life and death. How you meet these challenges is up to you. However, you can't simply run away from these situations and hide within the safety of home. Instead, you'll either have to overcome them or ultimately fail at you attempt.

Take Kung Fu Lu for example. This young man has grown into a proud and upstanding citizen of his hometown. However, not everything is well in this little shred of Oriental paradise. As the humble villagers go about their daily lives, they must endure the harsh reality of a deadly dragon plaguing their homeland. This lean, mean, fire-breathing machine has been terrorizing the townsfolk, leaving the village in a constant state of chaos and uproar. However, Kung Fu Lu hasn't taken this menace lying down. Once the hero has lost his patience, he approaches the wall where the monster resides. Armed with nothing but his puny wooden shield and enough moxie to make any established hero blush, he'll attempt to slay the dragon and become a legend. Unfortunately, he's clearly outmatched by this mystical menace, and you've got to make sure he doesn't end up as fried villager on a stick.

However, this mighty struggle isn't a hopeless cause. While Lu may be only a pathetic human, his real strength lies with his shield-wielding skills. As the massive monster starts shooting fireballs across the screen, our hero can deflect the attack using his trusty shield and send the scorching flames back into the dragon's wall. And while your foe may be a mythical beast of epic proportions, his living arrangements aren't quite as durable. As each fireball is bounced back into the wall, a chunk of plaster will fall off, whittling away at the monster's stronghold piece by piece. Sometimes you'll be able to take out wide swaths of the wall, other times you'll be forced to scurry back and forth across the screen to make sure the fireball bounces back for your attack. You'll have to dig through a few layers on concrete before finally breaking through the monster's stomping grounds, but the struggle is well worth it. With one carefully angled shot, you can take out the scaly baddie and restore peace to your homeland.

But even if you can master Lu's impressive speed and reflecting abilities, you'll still have long fight ahead of you. Thankfully, you won't have to face down this evil menace without help. While the shield may be all that's necessary to take out the wall and end the dragon's tyranny, the game comes with a few powerups to give you the extra advantage in case you find yourself in trouble. These flashy items will drift around your screen for a few moments, giving you the opportunity to snatch them up and use them for your bidding. Some will increase the size of your shield, allowing you some extra coverage in case you happen to miss the fireball coming at you. Others will force your ball to zigzag up and down the screen, taking out whole columns of the wall in the process. There's even a mystery item that will either help or hinder you, awarding you more bonus points or making the fireball speed up beyond human understanding. And with a decent array of difficulty settings for you to experiment with, chances are you'll be thankful that these items were so easily obtained.

But as you're reflecting balls and busting walls, you can still take a step back and appreciate the beauty of this epic struggle of man against beast. Kung Fu Lu may have a flattened and disproportioned spiky head, but at least he's dressed in the traditional combat outfit of so many martial arts that we know and love. Even though the dragon may be one of the most fearsome monsters to ever grace the Atari game library, its lively animations and bright colors seem to make it more appealing than scary. In truth, it looks more like a giant red slug than a deadly fire-breathing behemoth. Even his fireballs are only a few pixels of flashing color, letting our hero know exactly where he needs to be when crunch time comes. And while breaking down a giant wall may sound fun, the game's annoying high-pitched sound effects will leave your ears ringing after a few round. Once you've put some good music or some heavy-duty earplugs on, you may have a better chance at concentrating at the job at hand.

In the end, Off the Wall won't go down in the annals of gaming history as an innovative or intriguing game. Instead, all of the glory will go to Breakout, the game from which this game was based. This game will go on as the cheap knockoff, the unoriginal mix on a classic gameplay formula. And while that may be partially true, you can't deny that Off the Wall doesn't have its own unique charm. Unlike some of its contemporaries, this game makes an attempt at a background story, trying to give us a reason for us to play it. Sure, it may boil down to smash blocks with balls, but the constant flow of powerups and a considerable difficulty will make some seasoned gamers flinch. Though our hero and the dragon look horribly mutated and hardly recognizable, you can still relate to this clash of good versus evil. And if you only learn one thing from Off the Wall, it's that even the most average person can rise up to a challenge and bring it to its knees.

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 02/22/05