Your ship blew up. In a typical game, that would mean “game over.” In Every Extend Extra Extreme, that just means the beginning of a beautiful chain reaction of destruction, music, and flowing colors. Such has been the hallmark of the Every Extend series, but this chapter on the Xbox 360 has a definitively more laid-back feel with a faster pace and a greater amount of enemies that make bigger, prettier combos more accessible to everyone.

Now, even though E4 is much more easy to get into than its predecessors, the game still requires a bit of strategy—at one point, you have to know when enough is enough and stop the fun that a massive combo entails. Sure, it's easy to get lost in the lights and colors and forget about the object of the game. If you do that, an entire playing field full of power ups that will speed up the game, give better scores, and increase the amount of playing time will go untouched. A good combo cancel will be the difference between 5 billion and 5 trillion points—a sizable difference by any metric.

Lights and colors aside, the main attraction of E4 is the musical integration. A handful of techno songs back the dreamy landscapes of the game, with steady tempos that make the 360 controller's rumble thump to the beat in a feature reminiscent of the horrific Japan-only Rez Trance accessory. Following the beat is important in E4, as exploding on a beat gives a “beat bonus” that, when consecutively hit, gives up to a 5x score multiplier.

On the side, E4 also features a game mode called R4: The Revenge, which uses the same art and soundtrack, but features a completely different play style. Instead of the Every Extend tactic of blowing up and making chain reactions, R4 plays like Geometry Wars with a set number of enemies to destroy and a boss at the end of every level. While not the main attraction, the R4 mode makes for a few fun evenings chasing after achievements.

Follow the beat, enjoy the beauty, learn moderation—three simple cues that, when followed, make for a sublime gameplay experience with an almost limitless possibility for reward. As such, E4 makes for a good game to chill out with inbetween games of Halo 3. As long as you go in expecting an audio-visual feast that's good for killing some time, and not a deep shooter, you won't leave disappointed.