Explodemon! Preview (PSN)

‘Splosion Man is yet another Xbox Live exclusive that we’ll never see on PSN, but who needs it? This year, Curve plans to bring its own brand of explosive goodness with Explodemon!, a 2.5-D side-scrolling platform game starring a hero with unstable powers. Even better, it may be PSN exclusive.

Explodemon! sort of reminds us of ‘Splosion Man in the sense that you intentionally detonate the main character to get around, except this game has a much different vibe. Set in a sci-fi universe, its hero was clearly Mega Man inspired, with a similar albeit different colored suit and life bar. This seems to have been Curve’s goal, as the company intends to make this a “loving homage to old school SNES-era Japanese action games”, something that’s immediately apparent from watching the trailer.

The actual explosiveness comes into play whenever you need to destroy objects like crates or give something a shove to solve a puzzle. You can even blow up to give the character a boost across the playfield, something that’ll prove useful whenever he needs to make a quick escape.

That said, you’ll first need to build some sort of explosive meter on the bottom right corner of the screen. We’re not sure how it works, but based on the video (and since it fills quickly), we’ll guess that you’ll have to press and hold a button, then release it to blow up.

Although it appears to be a few months from release, Explodemon! seems like a fun action game that’ll be a great fit on PSN. As for exclusivity, it was supposed to debut on WiiWare as well, but the developer website says, “Explodemon! will release on PlayStation 3 on the PlayStation Network in 2010.” Stay tuned for more info in the near future.