Xbox 360
Relentless Software know us Brits love a good quiz show and as a result have been releasing Buzz! games for a good few years now. Each one involving classic quiz prerequisites like a flamboyant host (voiced by Jason Donovan), a gravelly voiced questions man and awful prizes, all from the comfort of your home.
Buzz! Quiz World is the newest attempt to get us all online and quizzing against family and other households, selecting your own character from a group of animated caricatures including cheerleaders, nurses and knights and choosing an accompanying annoying buzzer noise from the likes of chipmunk squeaks to a siren, there is also a new personal touch of allowing you to choose your own name from a predetermined list, if you are lucky to be on this the host, Buzz will address you correctly during the introductions and mid-round score updates.
Though it seems clever they have made a shortcut by shortening and grouping names, for example Helen is announced as Hel, Daniel as Dan etc. Having over 5,000 original questions with new categories like Current TV, Cartoons and Sport there is plenty to keep the game fresh. In a bid to keep the game interesting there are two areas to pick up new questions from, the Playstation Store offers new question packs or you can grab free user submitted questions.
The user submitted questions can be a mixed bunch, I selected some of the higher rated packs only to find them badly worded and on occasion wrong; think you can do better? Submit your own on www.mybuzzquiz.com.
To keep the game varied it is presented in a variety of new and old game modes. Classics like Point Builder, Stop the Clock and Fastest Finger return. The new rounds offer a few twists, Point Stealer allows the fastest finger to steal points from another player, Over the Edge will punish the loser with a dunk in a huge vat of gunge and Boiling Point is a first to six correct questions round.
Sadly any valiant efforts made earlier in the game to secure a win are rendered null and useless in the final round, which essentially is another rehash of fastest finger, begging the question what was the point? Buzz! Quiz World is a lot more flexible than before with a myriad of new play modes married with custom games allowing you to play any round style you like and a couple of decent single player challenges.
The online mode mirrors the offline game but allows eight players from around the globe to compete. I was looking forward to seeing a lot of new improvements but feel disappointed with what is essentially a limited re-jigging of previous games. If you are a Buzz! fan and have played the other games to their fullest, this is worth it solely for the volume of new questions. Bare in mind 1vs100 starts on Xbox 360 soon and it has real prizes, I know where I will be.