Whether you enjoy Trash Panic depends on whether you can tolerate its particular brand of difficulty. Trash Panic is a 3GB download that costs $4.99 on the PSN store. The game comes from Sony’s Japan Studio, which, come to think of it, might explain the difficulty. If you put it in an arcade cabinet, and cranked the difficulty up a bit, Trash Panic would be right at home next to some of Japan’s notoriously difficult arcade games. I honestly would have liked to finish more of the game before writing this review, but the difficulty prevented me from getting any further than the fourth level in medium.

Gameplay

Trash Panic‘s Japanese-flavored difficulty stems more from overall level design than from the game’s second-to-second gameplay. The game can be accurately described as a “physics-based-Tetris.” Instead of stacking neat rows of blocks in an enclosed space, Trash Panic challenges the player to stuff as many objects into a large blue trash bin as possible. The core mechanics revolve around breaking these objects to minimize the space they take up in the bin. As they arrive one by one, dangling from a magnetic conveyor belt on the right side of the screen, the player guides each object toward the bottom of the screen like a typical puzzle game.

Players can move trash side to side, and down with the D-pad while X and Circle flip the objects 90 degrees—the typical puzzle game controls. Unlike those puzzle games, however, objects can move unrestricted by a grid. The L1 button saves a piece of trash for later use. However, I kept confusing L1 for R1, which instantly drops trash. You can imagine how frustrating that can be at important moments. Shaking the Sixaxis will jostle the trash in the bin. Pressing Up or Triangle will launch the object downward. When a piece of trash strikes another, unshattered piece of trash, they can splinter to pieces. The trick comes in recognizing the physical properties of different objects. Wooden pencils and glass light bulbs break apart easily; metal and porcelain are tougher but are good at breaking other objects; rubber balls and sponges are nearly indestructible. Because the pieces from broken objects act like a cushion, care must be taken to break every object before it is buried. Otherwise, you can quickly lose access to pieces you need to break if you mismanage the unrelenting flow of trash. Hastened by the unbroken objects, the trash pile ascends to the top of the bin, threatening to end your game. If three undamaged objects spill from the bin, you lose.

Here’s where more advanced tactics come into play. A player can efficiently deal with trash by knowing whether objects break more easily when flipped horizontally or vertically. But don’t expect complex physics calculations during trash-on-trash impact. The game is powered by old and trusty Havok physics; it’s not exactly Euphoria physics engine precision. Speaking of our old friend Havok, expect to recognize the physics bugs that’ll pop up from time to time. Just like in Half Life 2, shoving objects against each other can cause them to flail violently as they jockey for collision space. Also, awkwardly compacted objects can go flying or even clip through the trash bin under the mounting pressure. However, these bugs either happen rarely or don’t detract from gameplay.

Taking a note from Katamari Damacy, each of Trash Panic‘s levels increase in scale until we find ourselves compacting islands, freeways and glaciers. To add variety to gameplay, later levels challenge players to burn or biodegrade your trash with fire and fungus balls. Fire must be managed by closing the bin’s lid with the L2 bumper to control the level of oxygen and heat inside. Fungus must be fueled by water from barrels and toilets.

In addition a later level throws fungus killing oil into the mix. This apparent balancing act between environmentaly friendly fungus and smog spewing fire is measured by the “eco” and “ego” ratings the game gives you at the end of each level. At first I assumed players could choose either eco or ego playstyles. I imagined a player choosing to only use the fungus balls to score higher. But the level’s linear progression forces players to light fires and grow fungus at predetermined times. The trash is fed in a mostly set order with matches and fungus balls coming to empty your bin. If one important match gets smothered or your fungus is killed, then it’ll be virtually impossible to win at that point. I would’ve enjoyed room to improvise, but as the levels get harder, our unwelcome friends from a bygone era, Trial and Error, rear their ugly heads.

The game’s five levels quickly become punishingly difficult. I found myself playing levels over and over again on the game’s easy mode to find the intended strategy and move on to the next level. Which brings us to my next gripe: levels are unlocked for free play only after you’ve finished them in campaign mode. As a result, there’s no way to conveniently practice a level. If I wanted to go through the motions of learning a level I had to play through each stage till I reached that level. It is an annoying and time consuming design decision.

Game modes

The game’s five levels can be played in three difficulty levels and “Endless” mode. To round out the features, we have a challenge mode and a versus mode. Challenge mode lives up to its name. After almost a dozen tries, I only managed to come within a hair of finishing the first challenge. I had to ring a metal bell by flinging wooden logs against it. However, the logs pile up and must be burned away by the matches you are given at regular intervals. Another challenge involves completing the game’s second level with only a half sized bin.

The local Versus Mode pits two players against each other with very small bins. Spilling only one unbroken object from the bin will end the match, making for quick, focused gameplay. Unfortunately, when I played against my friends, they seemed to have little interest in this mode.

Nitpicking

I found myself spending a lot of time staring at the game’s loading screens. Any time you transition between game modes and menus the game presents you with a completely white screen, absent of any animated loading icons. In addition, the main menu features television screens with static images of the levels you can choose. Taken together, these things seem to suggest Trash Panic could’ve spent some more development time in the oven.

The music is this kind of Japanese techno that I vehemently ignore. It’s so repetitive and full of cheesy English phrases that I wore headphones to listen to podcasts while playing. However, I was showing the game to a friend and he, inexplicably, thought the music was cool. It’s a matter of taste, I suppose.

Trash Panic implements the same YouTube uploading technology used in PixelJunk Monsters and Eden. Pressing Select and R1 during gameplay will start the recording. Hitting it a second time will stop it and bring up a prompt for your YouTube login. If you deny it, a video file will be created on your PS3 hard drive. While the videos are rendered in an unattractively low resolution, the quality is good enough to make out gameplay.

If Trash Panic were more expensive than $4.99 I would be demanding my money back. As it stands, smashing trash to bits was enjoyable, addictive even. Though it was frustrating at points, I’ve gleaned more than enough entertainment bang for my buck.

C+

Exceeds Expectations
+ Smashing trash can be addictive.
+ Fire and fungus add fun variety to physics gameplay.
+ Can be challenging(if you like this sort of thing).
Needs Improvement
- Loading screens and menus seem cheap.
- Physics bugs.
- Levels are unlocked only after beating them in the campaign mode.
- Trial and error is necessary.