Cut the Rope

CNET Editors' review

by: Jason Parker on October 27, 2010

Cut the Rope is an inventive, addictive, and extremely polished arcade puzzler, in which you interact with increasingly complex, physics-based puzzles to get a piece of candy into the mouth of a cute monster named Om Nom.

Cut the Rope's interface starts out simple: you just swipe your finger to cut a rope, which drops an attached piece of candy into Om Nom's mouth. Soon, you're cutting multiple ropes (occasionally more than one at a time, using multitouch), trying to maneuver the plummeting piece of candy to pass over stars on its way to Om Nom (between one and three stars, which equates to your score for each level). The game slowly introduces new elements--like candy-lifting bubbles and candy-breaking spikes--that make the timing and precision of your actions more important. Over its 100 levels, Cut the Rope throws even more challenges at you, including sliding anchors, arcing lightning, candy-eating spiders, and more elements that you touch to interact with, such as blowing air cushions and pulleys with hand-cranks. The levels are divided into different unlockable "boxes" (Cardboard, Fabric, Foil, and Gift Boxes; you unlock the fancier boxes by earning stars), but you can play any puzzle within a box once it's open--so you can skip puzzles that get frustrating, and it's easy to go back later and try to improve your score on individual puzzles.

Like other super-successful iOS games, Cut the Rope is a perfect storm of gaming: it's very easy to learn, incredibly addictive, and fun to pick up and play for minutes (or even seconds), and it makes great use of the multitouch interface (there are a couple moments in the game where it's almost easier to set your device down, so you have enough fingers free for snipping). Cut the Rope has countless thoughtful touches in its interface, sound, and artwork. It's a must for physics-based puzzle fans, who at the very least should check out Cut the Rope Lite.