The Xbox Live Arcade has often been the place the most inventive of titles call their home. It's a place for the sort of games that you might feel a little bit reluctant to plonk down £40 for, but would happily risk £6 or £7 on a game that's a little bit weird, but may turn out to be something special. Leedmees is one of those games.
One of the few Kinect exclusive Xbox Live Arcade games, Leedmees sees you playing as what looks like a cross between an Easter Island head, and one of those giant blow-up people you see at football games. As with many Arcade games, the idea here's simple - all you have to do is get the little people, known as Leedmees, from the blue portal to the red one - but, as ever, there's a catch. Instead of putting items down to guide the leedmees to their goal, you have to use your body as a bridge, and a barrier, to safely transport them to the exit.
The little picture in the bottom right helps a lot, as it lets you see eactly what Kinect sees.
The early levels work as great introduction to the various ways you can help guide the leedmees to the exit, and help novices find their way around what's actually a pretty complex game in an intuitive way. By stretching your arms out to the side to form a bridge, and catching one of the leedmees as they drop down from the blue portal, you can literally walk them to the exit - but you have to remember, from the moment they drop out of the blue portal, the leedmees keep walking too, and, like lemmings, they won't stop if they see a cliff - instead, they'll just keep going. In fact, the only thing that'll make them change their direction is when they meet a wall - either in the level, or in the shape of your arm. Intuitive in its controls, you can push the Mees around the levels, and even throw them, too - although they can only survive a fall from a certain height...
As you play, the levels quickly get a lot more complex, and you'll need to be a master of multitasking to see this through to the end. For starters, your leedmees drop out of the blue portal in batches, with no warning of how many are coming in one go, so you'll need a contingency plan if you don't want the last few to splat on the floor. As the levels start to be populated with spikes, ghosts (which you need to waft away), and increasingly precarious platforms, you'll need to think up a battle plan before the level even begins.
It's not often you have to use your legs - but there are times when things can get a bit awkward.
But that's one of the best parts about Leedmees. It is, for all intents and purposes, a true puzzle game - but you get to give your body a workout too. For a change, the game actually copes with Kinect pretty well, as your legs aren't used all that much - you'll be using your arms to move the leedmees from one ledge to the other, and if they fall on the floor, all you have to do is lean down with your hand, and they'll leap up, and grab on. In multiplayer, it's a slightly different story, as you'll obviously need a lot more room - but we'll get to that later.
Each level also comes with a number of bonus stars, which are awkwardly placed throughout the level, for you to pick up along the way. Designed to make you push your skills to the limit, the stars are placed in the most fiendish of places, forcing you to bring your leedmees within an inch of their life (literally), located a few millimetres away from spikes, and huge drops, making getting a perfect rating on any of the levels even more of a challenge.
However, one of the biggest design flaws with Leedmees is that, by design, you're required to have your arms outstretched for pretty much the entire level. In case you've never tried it, holding your arms out to the side for several minutes isn't all that easy - and when you're shuttling leedmees from one side of the screen to the other, it's often exactly what you'll be doing. Moments where you feel comfortable enough to put your arm down - or even realise that you're holding an arm up unnecessarily are few and far between, meaning leedmees is often only good in short bursts.
Co-op gets confusing fast. It's tricky enough in single player - but still a huge laugh. Just try not to tread on the poor guys and kill them!
Like all good Kinect games recently, Leedmees also comes with a full two player co-op mode, for two people on the same console. The levels here are every bit as inventive - and every bit as fiendish - as the ones in the main game, with plenty of ways to keep you on your toes. In some levels, it'll be up to one of you to catch the leedmees dropping out of a portal, while the other one will have the portal somewhere on their body - either their foot, arm, head, or torso - and it'll move around. With plenty of physical contact almost required between the two players, it's best to do this with someone you know well, as it has the potential to lead to one or two dodgy situations - and plenty of laughs! Trying to get the leedmee into the portal, and ending up accidentally squishing it on your co-op partner's thigh happens a tad too often - but that doesn't make it any less funny. Another level sees you having to touch your co-op partner, to make a circuit, whilst putting your foot, and your hand on switches in order to disable a trap that's threatening to splat your leedmees above - a bit like vertical twister.
Sadly, though, the mode's not without its faults, as there are a few silly mistakes that make co-operating harder than it should be. First of all, your giant can only move on your half of the screen, but there's nothing to tell you which player is which giant. The handy little box in the bottom left hand corner, which lets you see what Kinect's seeing in the single player mode, actually makes things worse here, as it colours the pink player in blue, and the green player in pink - just to make sense. It can be a bit confusing to begin with, when your two giants simply vibrate in the middle of the screen, no matter how much you move - but if you've read this review before playing, now you know.
Although it does get fiendishly hard, there's a lot to like about Leedmees - and, it's another inventive use of the Kinect sensor. Giving your brain and body a workout, and giving you a lot of fun, without emptying your wallet, if you own Kinect, there really aren't that many reasons not to give Leedmees a go. For only 800 points, or under £7, it's well worth a download.
Format Reviewed: Xbox 360
