At first sight Audiosurf can easily be compared with Guitar Hero. Based on a song you choose yourself - this can be from a cd, mp3, wav, flac, wma, m4a or off-file, a road is made that is perfectly fit for the music. It moves up and down on the rythm of the song and is loaded with tons of blocks that are placed based on the melody. This all is drawn in a classy retro environment in flashy and contrasting colors. The idea is to collect blocks with a rocket and make groups of three or more.

Unofficially the gmae has two modes. One is called Mono and contains, as the name implicated, only one type of blocks. There the idea is to collect the colored ones and let the grey blocks alone. The more you collect in a short period, the higher the multiplier and accompanying score.

The other mode, that actually exists out of five variations, contains several colors. The goal is again to make groups of three, but the diversity adds more difficulty. The difference between the color modes is in the small "powers" the space shuttles have. One can put two blocks temporarily in the buffer, while another can for instance push blocks aside to lay them down somewhere else. Almost every mode is playable in three difficulty degrees, going from very slowly to... let's say véry quick.

After playing a level the score gets sent through the internet and gets a place in the world rankings for that song. It's even possible to filter the scores by country or that only those of your friends are shown.

The controls are developed for the mouse but also work with the keyboard or - in my opinion the most fun - a dual-analog gamepad. A fun extra is that the game can also be played with two players, although on the same computer. The second player can opt for the keyboard or gamepad, and it's even possible for both to play on the same keyboard.


The game costs $9.95 and is currently only available through Steam.