Chime is a 'tetris-esque' type of game in that players place different shaped blocks in order to create squares (or quads as they're called in game). The bigger the quads the bigger the points you make. From the description so far Chime is an adaptation of tetris. However the twist that Zoë Mode (the developers behind Chime) have integrated is a mechanic that involves using sound and the players' block positioning to create different compositions. I should also say that to each level there is a different track composed by a different artist that plays through the entirety of the level.
There is also a line that runs from left to right, sweeping across your placed blocks. As the line crosses the blocks a note is played that is in the same key as the track being played, so consequently creating a new song depending on how you placed you blocks.
I'm not expecting you to get it from by bad description but if you follow the the Youtube link below then hopefully with my description you'll get it:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B11LXvmraus&feature=related
There has been alot of hype surrounding Chime, pre and post release, about it's synergy between music and gameplay. I would completely agree that there is a certain relation between the two, however for me music and choices made in game aren't related.
From a musical perspective I'm sure Chime is a really cool way of recomposing songs and adding elements that weren't originally intended. Although from a gameplay perspective, after a few hours of playing Chime, I failed to see how a simple gamer like me could get involved properly with creating my own unique composition. I found that my choices in game were influenced only by the shapes of the blocks I was handed, much alike they would be had I been playing Tetris. I keep mentioning Tetris however I don't want to give off the impression that I'm undermining the efforts put into developing Chime or attempting to be flippant and having a 'Oh it's basically Tetris with music' attitude, because I'm not. I'm just stating that there is a relation between the two in that you are placing blocks to form shapes for points.
As I was saying, my choices were influenced in the same way that they would be had I been playing Tetris. I think this was mainly because my score was cumulated based only on my block positioning, so I felt no need to focus on the musical aspect of it. The musical element was quite a nice feature, but again it had no effect on my progress or scoring. For me that wasn't really enough. I did a little test and tried playing Chime with my sound muted, and found that I placed my blocks in the same way that I would had it not been muted, which I think was the same time I started to lose enthusiasm for Chime. Perhaps this relates to what Trefry was saying about the hardcore expecting complexity from casual games, maybe my score based mentality was blinkering me from enjoying the music that I created, so perhaps I'm being too tough.
However, personally I think that a nice iteration to Chime would be to add some kind of composition bonus, or something that would link the music to the scoring. Perhaps if players' placed blocks in a certain way that corresponded to techniques used in creating melodies or tunes in music. For example if a player organised their blocks in a sort of zigzag shape then that would create a vibrato and that would add a multiplier or maybe just extra points to you current score. Or if the player arranged the blocks to create an inclined/declining shape then that would play a melody using a scale that would compliment the song. I'm not an expert in music so I can't reel off a load of different shapes and potentially related musical techniques, but I'm sure there are other means of doing so. This for me would help to create a stronger bond between block positioning and the music that the player was making. This was the sort of thing that I was expecting of Chime originally, a way for a non-musically educated person like me to get involved in creating their own tune combined with the block placing mechanic. I understand that this game isn't solely based on composing music, however after listening to all the hysteria that followed Chime I think I felt a bit cheated into buying and playing it.
I think the best thing to do to demonstrate what I'm saying is to play Chime, you can get it off of the Xbox live arcade and I think it's available from the Playstation store as well. Buy it if you're not put off by my review, give it a go and see if it works for you.
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