Art and music collide in Electroplankton, which features the striking visual style of Japanese interactive media artist Toshio Iwai. You interact with 10 species of Electroplankton by using the Nintendo DS touch screen. When you come in contact with the Electroplankton and elements of their environment, the microscopic merrymakers give off a unique sound. The sounds will ring familiar with you, from a piano and percussion instruments to your own voice.

Being the holidays and winter, we'll discuss the Marine-Snow Electroplankton in this preview. These Electroplankton look like snow crystals. They make sounds when you touch them. You can make your own musical snow globe, or sorts by swirling them all up, but when you look at them individually, you see each one has a voice waiting to be heard.

Marine-Snow Electroplankton come in three sizes, but their size does not dictate their sound. Instead, the Electroplankton's sound corresponds with its position on the touch screen. When you start, the Electroplankton are lined up in five rows with seven Electroplankton per row. Marine-Snow make a sound similar to a piano. The top-left Electroplankton make the lowest bass sound and the bottom-right represent the highest treble.

Sure, you could take your stylus and swirl the Marine-Snow around like falling winter flurries. However, you can make a more cohesive composition by tapping one Electroplankton at a time. When you find the Electroplankton that makes the noise you want, tap it. It then slides to the middle of the screen and trades places with the "Middle C" Electroplankton. If you tap that Middle C Electroplankton, the Electroplankton you originally tapped comes back to you, so you can alternate between those two notes for as long as you might want.

Basically, when you tap a Marine-Snow Electroplankton, it trades places with the last one tapped. When you get four or five in the mix, you'll have Marine-Snow flying everywhere! If the Electroplankton are close together, you can make a chord and bring other notes in and out when you tap another Marine-Snow.

Almost sounds complicated, doesn't it? The great thing about Electroplankton is it works on a variety of different levels. The precision of the Electroplankton's movements can help you create fantastic compositions, or you can take a more recreational approach and play with the different movements and sounds and just have fun with it. If you're savvy with recording equipment, you can use the DS's headphone jack to output your composition and record it for all the world to hear.