I’ve been playing marble games since 1984 when Marble Madness launched the genre. Since then I’ve played countless clones and knockoffs in the arcade and at home; on the screen and more recently in VR, and while each new game tries to evolve the genre none of them really do. Marble It Up! is the most recent addition to the marble game library, and while once again it fails to add anything new to the mix it does polish the concept and the presentation to a reflective perfection unmatched by even the shiniest of marbles.
Those of you tinkering with your Xbox 360 back in January of 2006 might remember an Xbox Live Arcade game called Marble Blast Ultra. If you check it out, you’ll find a game that looks remarkably similar to Marble It Up!, albeit with slightly dated visuals. The two games share the same developers as well as the core concepts and gameplay design only this latest game packs in that next-gen punch with stunning visuals and silky-smooth framerate scalable to 4K and supporting a variety of aspect ratios. What the game lacks in variety of textures it more than makes up for in wild architectural design for the actual puzzle levels and the interesting skyboxes that surround you.
The core gameplay hasn’t changed; race your marble from the starting position to the end in the shortest time. There are tiered time goals where tenths of a second become crucial and plenty of power-ups are scattered about the levels to help shave those seconds off the clock. Ghost races and leaderboards will keep you coming back for more, and when you have exhausted the in-game content checkout the curated library of gamer-created levels in the Steam Workshop.
Marble It Up! definitely perfects the gameplay of the classic marble game with fantastic controls and realistic physics that include spin and momentum. Changing the spin on the marble while in midair will cause it to change course upon impact; a useful tool in obtaining the fastest times or just getting a boost at launch. There are varied power-ups that also come into play, either slowing down the clock or turbo charging your marble with a burst of speed. You’ll need to navigate obstacles, narrow paths, vertical walls, and dizzying ledges as you explore increasingly more complex and challenging level designs.
Controls are tights with one stick controlling the marble and the other the camera which you learn to work together for flawless movement. The buttons will trigger a jump or activate any stored power-up, giving you all the tools to start posting those record times to the leaderboard. As expected, there is failure and trial and error in the later levels as you play and repeat levels until you nail that gold time. Things get crazy when elevators and sliding and swinging platforms are introduced and levels start twisting around like a Mobius strip or start to defy gravity like an M.C. Escher painting.
Marble It Up! has great music and simple sounds to reflect a rolling, bouncing marble and a few power-up effects. The visuals are outstanding with simply polygon designs and interesting textures for the various surfaces. These wondrous architectural puzzles are all suspended within ever-changing skyboxes that were constantly testing my fear of heights. My only minor quibble with the game is that the designers seem to be relying on the game community to provide much of the value. Depending on your skill and determination, the 50 levels included in the game can be finished in a couple of hours leaving you at the mercy of the community or your own aspirations of becoming a level designer for continued fun.
I’ve been a huge fan of the marble game genre for over 30 years, and Marble It Up! easily secures a spot in my top 5 within this niche category of games. The controls, the look, and the sheer addictive nature of the game kept me hooked from start to finish and even had me checking out some of the curated level designs. If you’re willing to explore what the Steam Workshop has to offer then this game is a great value, but if you are only interested in the official levels then you might want to wait for a sale. Either way, fans of rolling marbles through dizzying level designs should not miss this.
