Review: Rainbow Rapture (Xbox 360; XBLIG)

What if I told you that a little indie game that features a light, fluffy cloud at the end of a rainbow as the playable character was actually a hellish tale of Armageddon? Read on.

I had no idea whatsoever Rainbow Rapture was going to be like when I started it up. At the time I thought I did though. I figured it was a happy little game that more than likely would be a good bet for kids. Not so much.

The story behind RR (warning: it’s a thin one) is that the rainbow cloud has awakened and that means that the end is nigh. Your task in playing as this rainbow cloud is to devour as many people as possible along the bleak city streets of various cities, thus ending their miserable existences.

Power-ups are few and far between

As RC glides down from on high and slides across the turf (devouring people) he also tosses out taunts and judgements on all of humanity. It’s really funny stuff- and can even be a little disturbing at times as ‘he’ says things like “look what you did with all we gave you! You made everything gray!” He’s a mean one, that rainbow cloud.

Controls are exceedingly simple. All you do is hold down the ‘A’ button to drop the death rainbow down towards the Earth. Then when you hit a nice slope, just release ‘A’ and you’ll soar back upwards. The trick comes in finding a good ski jump of a hill to glide up off of- sometimes a task that’s easier said than done.

Challenges give you more things to do

Also very important is managing your people eating with your momentary return’s to the stratosphere. You need to do both (and collect power-ups like oil to let you hug the ground) to stay alive as your cloud’s ‘life’ is constantly draining and eventually, no matter what you do, you will run out of steam. Apparently godlike vapor can’t stay on Earth for all that long.

So at its core, Rainbow Rapture is kind of a race to no particular finish line. It’s a pretty enjoyable one though, as sliding and catching big air quickly turns into one of those ‘one more run’ type things. There are also challenges (that function like Achievements) to take care of to shake things up a little.

This is a very simple game, there’s no doubt about that- and it won’t be something that you’ll put 20+ hours into. You won’t even put 10 hours into it for that matter- this is really one of those games that serves best as a time waster or palate cleanser between bigger titles. You know, I’d really like to see this as an iOS game- something I’m starting to think about quite a few Xbox Live Indie Games now that I think about it.

Oil slick hell beast!

Rainbow Rapture costs a paltry few points and will definitely give you something to like. It is a limited appeal, it’s true, but as long as you’re looking at the game for what it is- I think you’ll enjoy this little apocalypse.

– Jason M