★★★★☆

Mutant Blobs Attack, a 2D Vita downloadable launch title, wears its influences on its sleeve. The 1950s B-movie soundtrack, the Ren and Stimpy art and animation style. the Katamari Damacy collect-household-objects-to-grow mechanics.

Nevertheless, this is a game more than the sum of its parts, offering players the chance to assume the role of a gelatinous blob from outer space on a quest to eat and grow and grow and eat till you make it off Planet Earth on a rocket ship to the moon.

It starts in the microcosm of daily living, as you munch on pencils and drawing pins, unclogging drains to slurp your way through pipes as you race to increase your girth and, with it, earn the opportunity to eat larger objects. The blob enjoys a precision of control at odds with his shape and texture, making this a tight platform game at heart.

But the abilities born from his malleable form add depth and interest – the way he can squeeze through the slightest of gaps, and stomp pound down onto weaker objects to snap them in two. It’s an interesting range of textural ability and when the game begins to throw in rocket propulsion (allowing the blob to fly around the screen) and ramps up attackers to planes and tanks, the game assumes a pace and pitch entirely of its own.

The difficulty scales quickly, eased only but frequent checkpointing, but the challenge is derived from ingenuity and the designers throwing new tools and tricks to master rather than merely adjusting the maths of your health bar, or spreading out the checkpoints.

It’s one of the most assured launch titles in the Vita’s line-up, one bursting at the seams with creativity, not only in its aesthetics but also in its mechanics, and one of the titles better suited to portable play. For less that £6, an essential purchase then.