The Maw Review (360, XBLA)

Hunger…STRIKES!

Although loyal and downright lovable, pets do have their downsides. Be it their tendencies to howl all night, bite friends and family or tear up anything left unattended for 2 minutes, patience can be tested and some would question why the hell they didn’t just get a Tamagotchi. So when Twisted Pixel gave me the opportunity to look after a cute ‘ickle blob of an alien, I was at first welcoming of the idea, and then started expecting the worst…

…and the worst is what I got. After a huge spaceship crash allowing him to escape the clutches of galactic Bounty Hunters, protagonist Frank the alien is thrown alongside the deadliest creature known to man, ‘The Maw’. At first the gelatinous diddums seemed harmless when taken for a walk across the planet…and then it got hungry. Then I realised that the Maw was in fact a fierce and relentless cannibal that gobbles any living organism in its sight. Despite the fact that this is a beast of apocalyptic proportions, he decides to stay loyal to Frank, and both make use of each other in order to escape the clutches of the Bounty Hunters.

It transports you into the land of Saturday morning TV incredibly well.

Unfortunately for the Bounty Hunters, ‘The Maw’ has another trick up his sleeve. The more he eats, the bigger he gets…and his weight problem doesn’t appear to get any better. As soon he begins towering above monsters, spaceships and mountains, the creature you once loved as a pipsqueak becomes a weapon of mass destruction. However his love of calories is necessary in order to progress through the game and to further ingest even bigger monsters…and even parts of the environment.

Looking around at the areas, you’ll notice that this is a graphically impressive instalment for the XBLA. Levels aren’t treated to the graphical detail we see from a lot of next-gen titles, yet all visuals are crisp, lush and it transports you into the land of Saturday morning TV incredibly well. A more sceptical set of eyes, however, will dust away the cuteness and see before them a linear set of levels consisting of basic paths from A to B.

In order to prevent the game slipping into monotonous platforming, eating some creatures allows the Maw to evolve and gain unique abilities, from being able to float like a hot air balloon, to breathing spewing fire…to turning a nasty shade of blue. Almost each level allows your morbidly obese creature to evolve in a completely different and unique way, and insures at least one good chuckle per level. All these evolutions and different forms are necessary to pass various environmental puzzles chucked in to make the main bulk of the gameplay.

Although some of these puzzles do encourage you to turn the rusty cogs in your brain, some just aren’t complex enough to challenge the experienced or older gamer. Clocking in at a maximum of two and a half hours, some may feel short changed by the experience. Youngsters, however, will lap it up and see it as an incredibly rewarding adventure. Should they ever get stuck, a fairly patronising arrow will lead them to points of interests along with button commands to hold their hand prompting them where to go and what to do.

It seems that opinions on ‘The Maw’ are split down the middle with an age gap. Adult players will stay for the short ride and find it entertaining, yet won’t be wishing to come back any time soon. However, kids will find an enjoyable experience in here no matter how many times they play due to the games’ unique charm. ‘The Maw’ is more about the spectacle than the substance of a video game, yet still delivers an enjoyable outing which will stand out as a unique gem on XBLA for quite some time.