Original Author: Sibley Tutor

Credits: Jagex

Date of first draft: 1st August 2008

Dates of edits:
- 18/02/2009 Added to website.

On July 30, 2008, Jagex Ltd. released their newest multi-player game to the FunOrb community, called “Pixelate.” It is in the Genre “Puzzle” and is a very unique game compared to other games Jagex has released. Load the game and you’ll come up to the welcome screen, shown below.

At the welcome screen, you are able to start a single-player game by yourself. There are other things that you have the ability to do at the welcome screen, but we’ll go over those after we go over single-player games.

Whilst clicking the button to start your own single-player game, you have the option of picking one of two modes to play your game in. They are “puzzle” mode and “challenge” mode. If it’s your first time ever playing this game, I would suggest playing the “challenge” mode because it gives you a small tutorial on the basics of the game and how to play it. The pictures below will show you what the game looks like, along with some instructions on what to do.

As you can see, the little boxes will tell you exactly how the game works, and what you’re supposed to do to complete certain levels. Your goal of the game is to arrange the tiles given to you to make your picture that you’re making match the picture that is displayed in the middle. You can use the arrow keys to move the tile around the board. (Alternate W, A, S, and D) You are also able to press the “Control” button on your keyboard to turn your given piece 90 degrees in a clockwise motion. (Alternate Key = X)

If you can see the black area outside of the grid on the second picture, that means that you can put any color tile you want there, and it won’t affect your final project. The only thing that counts in the game is the area that is white. Use the black area appropriately and to your advantage.

The tutorial in my opinion is very express and very laid out. You are easily able to see what you need to do via the information boxes, and you are given tiles that correlate to the grid fairly much. This makes the tutorial go by smoothly and to prevent as much confusion as possible. The challenge mode itself is quite bland however, I think it’s a little too broad and just, there isn’t very much to do with it and not really a challenge, it’s just get the grid before the time runs out.

The other mode you’re able to play is called the “puzzle” mode. The object of the game is to represent the image shown on the left on your grid. The catch is that you only get a select amount of tiles to do it in. Think wisely! There are a total of 50 choices of puzzles that you can complete, and you don’t need to complete any of the puzzles in a particular order, you can do any of the 50 puzzles as you wish.

(The Choices you have for puzzle mode, you get a check mark next to each puzzle that you have currently completed)

In my opinion, the Puzzle mode of Pixelate is excellent, it offers the experience of a challenge. It also is available to all experience levels and provides a moderately difficult puzzle for everyone.

That pretty much sums up the single-player version of this game. But that’s not all, there’s still many other features associated with this game.

When you’re at the welcome screen, you also have the option to enter the multi-player lobby. I have submitted a picture of the lobby below.

In the lobby, you’re able to create your own unrated game, where you\’re able to race other players to complete a pre-selected amount of puzzles, with an easy, medium, and hard difficulty. A full list of the options you’re able to choose is shown below.

If you’re subscribed for FunOrb, you’ll also have the ability to play rated games. The difference between rated and unrated games is that you’re able to raise or lower your rating from the default 1,000. You’re rating will increase if you race your opponent and get a higher score than them at the end of the selected amount of pictures. By completing a picture, you get 1,200 points added to your total score. If your opponent completes a picture before you do, you get a score of 0-916 points depending on how much of the picture you have completed in the same amount of time. A high rating is always great.

At the end of one game, you’ll always get a game ending screen, showing how many points you and your opponent have obtained, and who won the game. Refer to the picture below.

While setting up games, you have the ability to pick whether you do 5, 10, or 20 pictures. You also have the ability to select whether you want an easy round, medium round, or hard round. Below are the definitions for each. You are also able to choose whether you will allow spectators to watch your game. Those all have the option “don’t mind” which you can use which will make you find an opponent quicker.

Easy - Blocks fall at a slow speed onto a small grid.
Medium - Blocks fall at a moderate speed onto a medium sized grid.
Hard - Blocks fall rapidly onto a large grid.

In the lobby, you’re also able to spectate games, you can do this by finding a game on the games list and hitting “spectate.” Please note that some people prefer not to have spectators into their games, and you’ll see that you will not be able to spectate their games.

That sums up the multi-player part of this game. I’d have to rate this part a 9/10. It’s overall pretty excellent. All I wish they would have is a lobby chat box for those who are spectating games. Other than that, the multi-player portion is spectacular.

Apart from the games, there are a number of other things that you can change to optimize your game experience. You’re able to change your music and sound options. Some people prefer listening to audio while playing this game. While other people prefer to have it dead silent while racing their opponents.

There are also two detail modes that you’re able to change, one of them is high-detail mode and the other one is low-detail mode. The high-detail mode offers better graphics but uses more computer memory, this could be slow for some computers. The low-detail mode doesn’t offer as good of graphics as the high-detail mode, but your computer will run faster with these enabled.

If you are a member, you’re also able to convert over to fullscreen mode. This mode makes the game screen cover your whole computer screen. This may be an advantage for those who like to see things bigger. It might not work very well if you like to switch windows and other things of the sort.

You’re also able to view rankings among your friends in challenge mode. There are 10 ranks and the top 10 scores out of everyone on your friends will be on there.

There is also a button where you can view your achievements, you earn achievements by doing special things through the challenge mode area of the game. You can do pretty much everything to earn an achievement, it may help to read the descriptions of the achievements before you try to achieve one so you know what you’ll be achieving.

Also, the music on this game is tremendously excellent. I love the music in my opinion, it’s something you don’t hear much which gives it more sentimental value.

Overall I’d rate Pixelate a 9/10. The only reason why I wouldn’t give it a 10/10 is because of the reasons mentioned above. It’s a great game and I encourage you all try it. It stretches your brain and gets you much better at solving puzzles. It might even give you some advantage in real life. That’s why you need to try it. Try Pixelate today!