Let’s Tap’s collection of five mini-games is suitable for kids and some casual gamers, but this short title will have trouble entertaining an experienced gamer. The simple concept and spotty controls will quickly have the veteran gamer looking for something else to play.
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The Good parts (3 out of 5)
Let’s Tap comes to the Wii with a simple concept that will have kids tapping away happily as they play a series of five mini-games that challenge their ability to keep time. The game play elements allow kids to experiment with a concept that is reasonably intuitive. Plus, all children love to beat on a drum!
The Bad Parts (3 out of 5)
The Tap Runner and Bubble Voyager mini-games are plagued by spotty controls that feel like they only allow you to control the action occurring on the screen about 80 percent of the time. These two mini-games were also less fun than the other three to play, which was a function of both the control issues and unchallenging game play.
Yuji Naka, Sega, and the people at Prope certainly deserve credit for thinking of a truly devilishly clever and simple idea for Let’s Tap. Unfortunately, this game is way to shallow to even entertain the young for long.
Graphics (3 out of 5)
Let’s Tap’s innovative, colorful, and delightfully entertaining graphical presentation has plenty of neon eye-candy to keep the kids entertained for a few hours. The textures are really simple and details are basic, but it has a stylish and charming look that keeps your eyes dancing as you play.
The animations are smooth and look great for such a basic game, but then the mechanics are pretty simple and the depth shallow, so the game play doesn’t require a lot in this area.
Sounds (3 out of 5)
_Let’s T_ap includes a collection of electro-music tracks that have a nice energy and pace. They are matched well to the mini-game action that’s occurring as they play. The energy and beat of the tracks is infectious. Kids will be happily drumming along to these tunes, so you might want to grab a good pair of ear plugs if constant drumming irritates you.
Playability (3 out of 5)
Let’s Tap includes five unique challenges for the young mind to undertake:
- Tap Runner has kids drum lightly to guide a little man through an obstacle course and drum harder in order to jump over objects. Unfortunately, the controls took me along time to figure out and even then I felt like I only had control of the proceedings a percentage of the time.
- Rhythm Tap is similar to Donkey Konga. Kids need to drum along to gems scrolling across the screen.
- Silent Blocks implements a tower of multi-colored hexagon pancakes. Kids have to carefully add to the stacks without knocking the stacks over.
- Alchemist is a simple game that has kids tap out blocks in order to match and remove at least three blocks of the same color.
- Bubble Voyager is a kind of side-scrolling shooter; kids tap lightly to swim upwards in water, dodge attacks, and then drum harder to shoot projectiles at targets. Unfortunately, Bubble Voyager has the same control issues as Tap Runner, only each time you have to start over because of the controls, you’ll do so from the beginning.
The Final Word (3 out of 5)
Let’s Tap is an average title that will entertain kids and the casual gamer it was aimed at, but veteran gamers won’t find anything fun to do while playing this game. While it is a good first effort for a return of a legend in the business, the control issues prevent this simple game from being even more entertaining.
This post is part of the series: Let’s Tap Guide
More articles about Let’s Tap for the Wii.
