'Bit.Trip Runner' — 4.5 out of 5 stars
There’s a reason you don’t just run straight through Mario games: Goombas and Koopas don’t have day jobs, so they roam around and act as obstacles. Essentially, they’re the homeless population of the Mushroom Kingdom.
“Bit.Trip Runner,” however, has no qualms about keeping up a consistently breakneck platforming speed.
Depending on how much of a challenge keeps you sane (or drives you insane), “Bit.Trip Runner,” the most recent “Bit.Trip” title from Gaijin Games for WiiWare, will either have you smiling as you master rhythmic running or be the reason you need a new television (since your old one now has a Wii Remote-sized hole in it).
Thankfully, the game is broken up into more than 30 stages (unlike the three-level affairs of other entries in the “Bit.Trip” series), because getting hit once by an obstacle in any of these sections will have your existential protagonist, Commander Video, whooshed back to the beginning to try again.
Surprisingly, dying is one of the best parts of “Bit.Trip Runner.” Failing an obstacle will put you immediately back into the action at the start of the stage in a couple seconds, and it never breaks up the action. If you let it, “Bit.Trip Runner” will drain all your free time away as you take “just one more try,” thinking you can finally beat that odd coal miner who keeps throwing crystals at you for some inadequately-explained reason.
As the only single-player “Bit.Trip” game on WiiWare, “Runner” stands as one of the best titles Gaijin Games has offered so far and one of the best downloadable experiences on the Wii. If you’re in the mood for a rhythm platformer akin to “Canabalt” with some retro charm, have eight dollars to spare and a masochistic appetite for a challenge, “Bit.Trip Runner” is a no-brainer that’s all the more satisfying once you reach happy rainbow victory.