I loved Splosion Man and actually felt the difficulty was just right. I even played through hardcore mode (in which the difficulty is NOT just right) because I enjoyed it so much. I haven't picked up Ms. Splosion Man, but will at some point. If I have time, I'll write up my impessions.

Since I have had a blog entry for quite some time I'll try to do what I do best, complain/rant about things! This time the apple of my proverbial eye is the recent release of Ms Splosion Man. What puzzles me about this is that I can recall a few days before, probably when GB posted their quick look that I said to myself "Man, I remember how much Splosion Man kind of pissed me off, this looks exactly the same, too bad." Yet here I am, played it and am probably a bit more than halfway through it and low and behold it is and it is. They have certainly upped the production values of the game, but you would like to think so, right? It is not even evolutionary, much like its protagonist it is simply a (kind of) prettied up version of the original. If you enjoyed the merciless trial and error gameplay of the original than brother are you in luck because it is here in full force.

As mentioned by many, Ms Splosion Man is difficult not in what it asks, but under what conditions. Even after hours of playing I never feel 100% certain of the characters movement and general physics. Due to puzzle design many times it does not come down to real creative puzzle solving, but simply moving precisely where you should be and figuring it as you are flung from room to room with little time to consider what it happening. That seems like a old man complaint, but their were simply too many times when it boils down to reacting, lead to countless checkpoint restarts. Additionally, insta-death is everywhere and few rooms do not contain some way for you to meet your demise. Certainly Mario and Sonic games contain their fair portion of these, but they had arguably more tight control and only in much later levels asked you to be so precise. Splosion Man does this from the start and if anything it acts on it like a crutch. Though it certainly doesn't help that I am about the most impatient gamer imaginable, the first games lack of checkpoints between protracted gameplay set-pieces is another aspect puzzlingly left intact. I pretty much despise backtracking and replaying sections, so for me anything that causes that kind of roadblock pretty much makes me want to stop playing immediately.

So in conclusion, or the too long did not read version: DId you like Splosion Man? Then that's how your going to feel about this, Twisted Pixel has done little to fix its flaws and in the process released something that only somewhat quenches the thirst of its fans.