Trickochet, by 5minutes off, is a game of skill, reflexes, and even a bit of platforming. It's a lovely visual journey into one hero's destiny... which is, uh, apparently to fling balls around in the sky. It's simple, it's fun. It's also pretty weird. Why are you on magical sky platforms hurling balls at floating targets anyway? Are you a mouse? Then what's up with that tail? Who is your little Mr Miyagi mentor, and how does he get his Fu Manchu so luxurious? These are important questions! Burning questions!

Each level presents a number of targets floating in midair, and your job, nay, your duty is to hit them all by ricocheting balls off of platforms and the edges of the screen. Aim with the mouse, using the dotted line as a guide to plan your shots, and click to fire. You can also use the [WASD] or [arrow] keys to move, and tap [space] to jump. Don't worry if you fall off, since you'll instantly respawn back on safe ground. So why enable you to fall anyway, you ask? Well, sometimes to make an omelet, you have to break a few eggs. Or, uh. Send a mouse plummeting into nothingness. You can retry any level you've completed at any time from the main menu.

Different obstacles as you go along help keep the gameplay challenging, and the ability to progress regardless of whether or not you were good enough to complete a stage in a handful of shots versus, um, many, is a good move. But there are a few quibbles, such as the short timespan before projectiles vanish into nothingness. This means that otherwise legit trick shots wind up failing simply because it takes the ball too long to travel to its goal. The guidelines in the early levels also seem to be a bit off, since even lining up your path directly with the one outlined can cause you to miss.

It's not particularly deep, and it won't change the way you look at gaming forever (unless the concept of a mustachioed mouse completely blows your mind), but then, it doesn't have to be. Super simple and super charming, Trickochet provides a nice coffee break in the middle of your day and provides a much-needed dose of cute purple mice to drive away the doldrums. There are 32 levels on offer for you to perfect your ball-flingin' skills on, and presumably if you fail, the world ends. Or something. Look, do you think that little orange mouse would look so wise if there wasn't some important stuff going on?!

Play Trickochet