Xyience is back from the brink – and I am overjoyed at the thought of their products once again filling the shelves and coolers around the country. This is a great drink that deserves it’s chance to shine. All of their drinks have a unique flavor, a decent kick, and all with no calories.
It seems that even though their staff got major shakeups, they had millions of dollars in debt and hit bankruptcy last year they are still running strong as well as launching some new products. I even saw a huge picture of this cran/razz flavored can on the mat of the big octagon of a UFC match.

Packaging:8
I didn’t understand the use of the Japanese characters with the old can design – and think making them disappear was a great idea. I like the bare aluminum in this case, which is something that usually does not work too well. I think part of the reason it works is that the design is now so clean and simple. I love the basic red circles and easy to read text – nothing “XTREME” or obnoxious – just clean and very simple. They dont list the caffeine content in this incarnation, which I think is a mistake. Other than that – this design is much much improved.

Taste:8
I found Cran Razz to be a very tart refreshing drink. While still being no calories, this did not taste artificial or oversweet, and I actually thought there was real juice in there on first gulp. I don’t like me energy drinks over sweetened, and found this one to be very sharp and delicious. This was a great surprise – as I was expecting something a lot more cheap and weak. This is one of the tastiest energy drinks I have had in weeks!

Nutrition/buzz:8
This has all the energy drink stuff you would expect: way too much vitamin B, taurine, glucruonolactone, ginseng, inositol, and carnatine. It is sweetened nicely with the expected blend of sucralose and acesulfame potassium. One thing which certainly helped is they have 200mg of caffeine in the can, as opposed to the 160mg I was thinking it would have. Actually, this gave me more of a buzz than I thought! While not an over the top powerhouse, this still has quite enough energy for a good 3-4 hours of energy with no crash.

Website:8
For just one year since I have been here, a whole lot has gone on with this website. They completely redid EVERYTHING, from the overall look and feel to the backend. The main home page looks great – with a running beautiful slideshow advertising products and their marriage to the UFC. Turning it over to getfused.com was a fantastic idea – and they did a great website to be proud of – both from the design end and the coding end. You could find everything here, from the drinks and ordering, to all the UFC fighters they sponsor. While not the most fun site around, it is worth a stop if you are interested in their product.