Picture the scene, with Sir David Attenborough crouched over the Ovi Store ice field in Finland. There is no movement at all. Then a hapless gamer starts browsing the store, looking here and there for something new... and “Sissssss-exx” - out of the store vaults a game title nobody has ever seen before, devouring the gamer in one bite, before diving underground again.
Attenborough turns to the camera. “And... there... we see it. A new arcade game, by Nokia themselves, that can capture gamers' attention and never let it go.” A little cheeky smile and wink, knowing that back in the editing suite this clip will be played in slow motion at least five times. Job done, he waves to the first camera crew, who are being recorded by a second camera crew for the extended credits sequence (who in turn are being recorded by a third camera crew for the inevitable DVD special feature).
And the hapless victim, trapped in the grip of the horror that is a decent arcade game published by Nokia in the Ovi Store? Well I'm pleased as punch, because Exclusion has to be one of the finest mobile games I've played in a long time.
One of the big advantages is that Exclusion feels pretty unique – I've played a lot of mobile games on a variety of platforms, and I can't immediately recall such a game style (prove me wrong in the comments). The closest I can come to is Jezzball, but even then it's more a relationship of cousins than a lifting of a sibling idea.
You're presented with a game grid, full of different icons (called memes in this game) that are floating around the screen. You can 'cut' the game arena into two sections with a swipe of your finger on the touchscreen, and if one of the sections is filled with only one style of meme, then they vanish. Subsequent cuts should (in theory) reduce the number of memes until your last cut splits the last two types, the screen is cleared, and the level is finished.
Of course, it gets more complicated than that. As you progress through a level, more memes may be added to the arena just to keep it nice and full, but you do get a nice note to say when all the memes are uncovered and you can then concentrate on finishing the level. The memes bounce around the screen with little regard to where you want them to go – in fact, some levels have the dastardly flow, which is like a wind or tide pushing the memes around.
Whenever you make a cut, any memes that are close to the cut will be pushed away from it, so you have a tiny bit of control over the meme movement, but as you progress through the levels, you'll come across some that give you a limited number of cuts – just enough to split the groups, and none spare to influence movement. And thus the nature documentary at the top becomes something more than a wacky opening, because there are levels where you have to simply watch the screen... waiting... waiting... until the three hearts separate from the group of six different memes... pounce on the screen, force a quick cut to exclude the hearts from the memes... and then back to waiting for the next moment to slice away some more memes.
It's actually a crazy mix of absorbing the game arena and letting it wash over you, combined with arcade-like quick reactions. And it's wonderful!
Throw in maze like levels, time limits, manic boss levels, special zones memes have to be in otherwise they won't disappear, even if excluded, and you have something that I'd happily pay to play. Yet Nokia still have it in the Ovi Store for free.
What we have is someone sitting down with a platform and looking for the advantages – good top down graphics, accurate touch screen, gameplay that never feels repetitive but is easily played over short periods, add in a dash of re-playability and you have the making of a classic game. Sure, the load time is a bit slow, and I'm not yet convinced that collecting swirls to reveal a hidden picture adds anything to the game... but I'm still playing it.
Exclusion is very much recommended.
– Ewan Spence, June 2010.