Sound Shapes, the musically-inclined platformer with contributions form the likes of Beck, Deadmau5, Jim Guthrie and other fine musicians, has just launched today.
The game was first revealed by Jonathan Mak and Shaw-Han Liem at E3 in 2011, but this release signifies the realization of many years of work.
Underneath the very vibrant and jaunty launch trailer for Sound Shapes, a PlayStation.Blog post describes the game and some of its features (including a level editor), saying,
"Sound Shapes is a 2D musical platformer in which every level is a song. You pick up the notes placed in the level to construct the music, but at the same time the creatures (friend or foe) and interactive objects are instruments too. We’ve worked with different graphic and musical artists on each album of level-songs, with the likes of Shaw-Han in his I am Robot and Proud guise, Deadmau5, Jim Guthrie and Beck working with graphic artists like Vic Ngyuen of Capy, Pyramid Attack, PixelJam and Superbrothers. If the game stopped there that would probably have been more than enough work for us but we also decided that players should be able to use these notes, creatures and so on to make their own songs and levels. Therefore we’ve included a full level editor and online community which will allow you to share your creations across the entire world, reaching players on both PS3 and PS Vita no matter which version you’re using."
The game will also include Trophies unlocked by beating Death Mode, consisting of "intense platforming challenges" based on the primary campaign. Trophies can also be unlocked in the Beat School mode, which challenges players to make use of the level editor.
Sound Shapes is now out for $14.99 (or $11.99 for PlayStation Plus members), and is part of the PSN Play promotion, meaning that if you buy one or more of the other games in the promotion you receive an increasing amount of money back. But what's really cool is that Sound Shapes is cross-platform, meaning whether or not you buy it on either the PS Vita or the PS3, you will receive both versions simultaneously.
