There are certain games you know right off the bat are going to be cult classics—Blinx would be one of those games. Building on the unique puzzle style that Japanese games are famous for, Blinx is a combination item-collection, monster-bashing, beat-the-clock game in impressive 3-D settings.
You play Blinx the Time Sweeper, an orange tabby cat whose job is to collect time crystals and kill the time monsters in an um… timely manner. You get a vacuum cleaner to suck up objects like barrels and launch them at your foes. When you defeat the time monsters, they sink back into the floor (leaving a small stain) and drop time crystals for you to collect. Matching and collecting the different types of time crystals, you earn special time powers. You can then use the powers to enhance your monster-stopping abilities. There are also gold pieces to collect (and objects that increase your gold), which add up at the end of the stage as your "paycheck." Take that money to the store and upgrade your vacuum cleaner or buy new time powers and other nifty stuff.
One of the things that I love about this game is that there are so many little hidden areas and treasures that take strategy to find and recover. Sometimes it's a matter of having the right item, like a vacuum cleaner strong enough to suck up a really big boulder. Other times it's a matter of using a time power to change events and gain access to an area. And still other times it's a matter of realizing just what items you need to keep in your inventory to get both in and out.
Once you complete a stage, you're shown a screen that displays your score and replays your entire game in the background. It's a nice touch—it really gives you a chance to enjoy the game's visual extravagance. Blinx is a cat with real character, including a Cheshire grin he flashes whenever he's cleaning. Plus, he has nifty mirror-goggles and mirror-shoes.
On any given level, you can go back and explore previous stages, thus building up your cache of time powers, increasing your gold for that coveted item, finding other goodies that perhaps you couldn't access before, or just improving your time score. The levels aren't vast, so replaying the same level over and over again is enjoyable rather than tedious.
