This game just came to me this week but I instantly liked it and wanted to get the review done. It’s Likwid from FunMo Games, and it takes a puzzle approach to music.

The beatons come streaming in like particles of light and using various affectors you have to move them into the proper positions, the collectors. Doing so begins to fill them up and begins to play that particular track for the song whether it be rhythm, vocals, guitar, whatever. When you fill all of the collectors you get to here the entire song.

The game is free and gives you a full round of tutorials and one three-level track pack. After that you have to buy extra songs which are all 5-level track packs. That means for 99 cents you get five levels. Songs that are purchasable at present include:

•  All Star - Smash Mouth
•  Fly to the Angels - Slaughter
•  Here it Goes Again - OK Go
•  Hungry Like the Wolf - Duran Duran
•  La Bamba - Los Lobos
•  Let’s Dance - David Bowie
•  Lonely is the Night - Billy Squier
•  Modern Love - David Bowie
•  One Way or Another - Blondie
• This Aint a Scene - Fall Out Boy
• This Love - Maroon 5
• Sweet Home Alabama - Lynyrd Skynyrd

I imagine that if the game does well more tracks will become available over time. I liked the game somuch I already purchased the OK Go 5-level pack (what’s 99 cents after all?). I did have some problems getting the levels into place for some reason. I purchased them and then the app crashed while it was downloading and/or installing them. Going back into the app and the store I found that the app remembered I purchased it and asked if I would like to download it again, which I did. I actually had to reboot my iPhone to get it to install properly but it did and I’m satisfied.

The game truly takes a sort of unique approach. Each of the affectors can be dragged around the screen to where you want it and the area of affect. This then determines where the beatons go as they pass through the area and how strongly it affects them.

There are colored areas on the game screen that change the color of the beatons (what I’ve taken to calling the light particles in case you haven’t gathered that). On many levels you will have multiple collectors (purple, green, white) that you have to fill up and this can become quite challenging. Often I think I stumble upon a correct solution on accident. I say "a correct solution" because I beleive that the game could allow for multiple solutions on each level even though you are pretty much given a set of affectors that the developers might only have foreseen one solution for.

Now the background graphics are sort of generic and don’t always match up to the song. Why they didn’t use something like stylized graphics from the bands etc is beyond me. Perhaps a licensing issue, or perhaps they just didn’t think of it. Another thing I wouldn’t mind is to pay extra and get the levels for the game as well as the actual song for my music player. It’s 99 cents for the song’s levels so how about $1.50 or even $1.75 for song and levels? Just my 2 cents on the matter.

There are also some minor control issues where the game gets confused whether you want to move an affector or resize the area of effect. But it’s minor like I said and easy enough to work around generally.

I would have liked to see at least one more song in the free app but it was enough to whet my appetite and make me want more. I guess that old saying is true, always leave them wanting more...

Further Screens:

Future artists:

Other Likwid participating artists include  Everclear, Foreigner, Poison, Yellowcard, The Allman Brothers Band, Rise Against, Culture Club, The Exies, The Vapors, Grand Funk Railroad, N.E.R.D., Underoath, and many others.