Thumper is rhythm violence, exactly like it says on the tin. You play a metal beetle, skating down a track, forced to rhythmically move, flap and bounce to reach a floating head that seems to get angrier the closer you get

So what i wrote above is a creative stretch - i'm coming up with a story for the events of the game - but that's because Thumper is so abstract, things like theme and narrative just sort of, slide off. All that's left is the pure mechanical aspects, and some trippy visuals

Let's talk mechanics then. Well i'm not going to rewrite the whole manual, so please see here, if you don't know the moves already (don't worry, it's literally one page). The awesome part about Thumper is the music itself, which comes as much from the backing track as it does from each of these player inputs. As each obstacle arrives on the track (one measure/bar ahead) it makes a slightly different sound, which adds to the track being generated, but also helps a keen ear stay a step ahead

While the game is still very mechanical and abstract, it still managed to bring out emotions in me, which i guess is the whole attraction of music in general, that some arbitrary sequence of sounds can somehow be "sad", or "happy"

Also, it's just really rad to input a perfectly timed sequence of thumps, turns and bounces, for some unknown reason.
Also also, that ending… woah…. that was damn good