Boulder Dash: Rocks!, Nintendo DS

Boulder Dash: Rocks! was developed and published by German company 10tacle and released in Europe and Australia in 2007. It is a dual-screen remake of the classic action/puzzle game, Boulder Dash.

In this game Rockford must collect diamonds from a variety of themed worlds in order to win the heart of his girlfriend, Crystal. Gameplay is basically the same as classic Boulder Dash, but with a variety of new features, graphical flourishes, and tweaks.

The game is split into Planet Tour (single-player campaign), Route Race (plan a route then set Rockford moving on his own), Time Trial (unlockable), Double Dash (unlockable), and Extras (artwork et cetera).

New features include: a zapper gun with a variety of ammo that you can collect and does different things (like pull boulders toward you, or even disintegrate them), coloured keys to open specific colour doors, crushers, teleporters, brown boulders that cannot be held up or pushed, dynamite (touch it and a fuse starts burning; it’ll soon explode in a specific area), trapdoors (that only allow you through one way), and a wide variety of meanies – including boss battles at the end of each world.

One thing I will say about Boulder Dash: Rocks! is that it is a pretty tough game. Put one foot wrong and you won’t be able to complete a level and have to re-start. On top of that, the time limits on each level are very tight, which often forces you to rush through them and make fatal mistakes. It’s also fairly easy to accidentally push a boulder, which can render a level unfinishable. So the game can get frustrating at times.

Boulder Dash: Rocks! is not a bad game overall. It starts off a little disappointing, but does improve when you get into it.