Gaijin Games’ Bit.Trip series has been one of my favorite bundles of fun to come out of Nintendo’s WiiWare service. By marrying minimalist gameplay mechanics with charming retro vibes, each of the three previous titles has turned blocky graphics and bleep-blooping chiptunes into addictive affairs. Bit.Trip Runner carries on this torch, but for the first time puts you in direct control of the rectangular, gold-grabbin’ CommanderVideo. Does this frantic platformer have the stamina to keep up with the quality of its predecessors, or should our pixelated hero have spent more time carbo-loading?

Click here for the full review.

Tired of rhythm games filled with glitz and glam, high-priced plastic instruments, and licensed music you may or may not enjoy? Commander Video comes to the rescue with Gaijin Games’ latest WiiWare title, Bit.Trip Runner.

Read the full review here.

Alex Neuse: So basically, the initial concept behind Bit.Trip Runner in particular is that we wanted a sort of run-and-jump platforming game, kind of on par with some of those older games on the Atari 2600 like Pitfall!, Jungle Hunt, or even H.E.R.O., if you remember that one.

We also needed to evolve the character and story a bit by game four. It was a very deliberate move that we built up the abstract stuff in the first three games, which kind of represents the abstraction of what it means to be a human. And then we explore what it means to actually play as a human in game number four, with Bit.Trip Runner.