Burger Time World Tour Review

            I don't really know about the original Burger Time. From what I understand from my sister-in-law who has played it recently at an arcade, it is pretty similar to World Tour. I do know that when I recently did my PS3 Bucket list, I watched a video review of it and I thought it looked pretty cool, so I added it to the list. Then I heard on twitter from Nick Sutner, who works at Playstation, that Burger Time World Tour would be leaving PSN for good. I immediately purchased it so that I wouldn't miss out on it. I wasn't planning on playing it for awhile, but since I had to put it on my hard-drive and I don't like games to sit un-played on my hard drive for too long, I went ahead and gave it a whirl. I don't know if this review is really useful to anyone as the game isn't available anymore, at least not on PSN. Maybe it's on other platforms or will re-appear sometime in the future.

            In Burger Time World Tour, you run through 2d levels. Actually, the levels are round; they behave just like any 2d game, but they are rendered in 3d and they connect to themselves so that you can run around in a circle forever in most of them as if you are on the outside edge of a merry go round. This interesting idea also gives you a great sense of vision of the level as you can see the other side of the level behind where you currently are. It's an effect I've never seen before, and it's awesome. You can really plan out where you need to go because you can see the whole level. If the level was in regular 2d, it would be too big to see all on one screen. The levels also have a great sense of scale; some of them reach high into the sky, and the graphics and focus really make you feel like you are climbing up to the heavens.

            The goal of each level is the same; make a certain number of burgers. The burgers are huge; each layer is probably 8ft. across and burgers can be up to 12 ft tall or mayber more. Each layer of the burger (such as the meat, the veggies, and the bun) are typically seperated in vertical columns. You must traverse a series of ladders, platforms, obstacles, and enemies and run over each layer of the burger, which drops that layer down to the next lower level. You quickly learn that you need to start at the top because if you leave the bun up at the top you'll have to go back and get it and push it down through all the layers to get it down to the rest of the burger. Normally a piece only drops one level when you run over it, but if you drop it while an enemy is stopped on it, it will drop two levels, and if there are two enemies on it, it will drop 4 levels. You usually accomplish this by hitting enemies with pepper to stun them while they are on the ingredient. The enemies are all anthropomorphized foods (such as sausage, eggs, and habaneros), and using them to drop the burger pieces will also cook them into the burger, which causes it to become a specialty burger that gives you more points based on what you put in it.

            You run with the left analog stick or the d-pad. X is jump, square is attack with your pepper, and circle uses a power-up if you have ran over one. Triangle is used to pick-up and throw enemies when they are stunned. Throwing an enemy at another enemy will stun it, and if you run over a burger piece while holding an enemy, you will drop it with the piece and get all the usual bonuses.

            There are 40 levels. They start simple and get quite large and complex. Each of the country-themed levels add lots of variety in the form of new enemies with unique attacks (like hot peppers that explode when stunned or carrots that can drill down through levels without using ladders), new obstacles (like platforms that break when you use them, elevators, and fires that go on and off), and power-ups (like an energy drink that makes you invincible and super-fast or the rocket that lets you fly for a few seconds). There is a ton of variety and the game stays fun the entire time. In one level you might be going through maze-like corridors and up and down ladders to get each burger piece. In another there might only be one path, but it's really dangerous. One level might be swarming with enemies, and another might be filled with deadly traps and obstacles. No two levels feel the same. Each world ends in a boss fight against a giant foe or unique enemies. You still build burgers in these levels, but they have a few unique twists to them due to the boss characters attacking you from the background.

            The way the game gives you a star-rating at the end of each level seems a little off. When I did my run-through to get the trophy for beating every level without dying (as you usually have a few lives and start over from checkpoints if you die), I beat each level decently-under the par time and without dying, yet I received star-ratings as low as 2 and as high as 5 even though I couldn't perceive any significant difference in my performance. That's why I don't really feel an interest in trying to get the star-ranking trophies; I don't have a clear sense of what I could improve on, and trying over and over again to micro-manage my clear time and points doesn't seem fun. Beating all the levels without dying is really challenging and fun, however. Some levels will require many tries to accomplish this, but it stays fun even when you do the same level over and over, perfecting your route and your response to enemy patterns. The only bummer is the long load time whenever you re-start a level.

            The music is pretty cool. It's bouncy, upbeat stuff that has a few nods to old-school 8-bit sounding game music. This is true of the sound effects as well; some are pretty modern sounding, others sound like they were ripped right out of 1982, which is a really cool touch.

            Burger Time World Tour doesn't stick out in my mind as some super-awesome game, but I had a lot of fun with its frantic gameplay and interesting take on the presentation of a 2d game. It's a Great Game, Tier 3. Now, where is the nearest 5 Guys????