While both Windows and Mac saw versions which had the Ignition DRM stripped out, on Linux the game is left unplayable. The game has been unavailable for purchase since being removed from their store in 2011, and even if you had purchased the full version back in the day, you can no longer verify your key as the registration server is down. Marble Blast Gold never saw a retail release, with it just being sold as a digital download through the GarageGames website. Considering the state of the registered version as it exists now, this can feel more than a bit galling. The demo can also be a bit obnoxious, with it showing a begging screen imploring you to buy the full game after completing each and every level. I would have just included all of the early beginner levels, which introduce all of the mechanics before letting you tackle your first real challenge. I also find the selection of levels in the demo to be puzzling. Marble Blast Gold stayed performant even when set to display at higher screen resolutions such as 1024x768 or when using 32 bit colour depth the only exception being enabling Stencil Shadows, which does hammer the frame rate something fierce. To its credit Marble Blast Gold and the Torque Game Engine powering it do run rather well, even on a computer which would have been well into its operating life by the time the game came out.

The graphics are bright and colourful, while the music and narration remain jovial. These kinds of high reflex games have a way of trying both my nerves and patience before long, but the appeal sure is there for some. The goal of the game is to navigate an autonomous marble through a 3D playing world, collecting all of the gems needed and using the power ups provided to overcome the obstacles preventing you from progressing on to the next level.Īnyone who has ever played the free software title Neverball should be familiar with the basic concept, the main difference being that with Marble Blast you control the marble directly, rather than shifting around the floor to roll a ball. A six level playable Linux demo was released through the MarbleBlastGoldDemo-1.4.1.sh.bin installer. Marble Blast was first released in 2002, before being updated to Marble Blast Gold in 2003. This included a game of their own devising, Marble Blast Gold. Torque 3D would go on prove to be a favourite of a number of independent developers over the next decade, with the engine's maintainer GarageGames stepping in to distribute several of the games produced with it for Linux themselves. One of the titles that Loki Software released for Linux was Tribes 2, an online multiplayer shooter which was the first game to be released using the Torque Game Engine.

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