Spikey's Bounce Around: Bounce! Bounce! Bounce Around!
Written: Nov 01 '09
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Product Rating:
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Pros: tricky puzzles, simple controls, diverse levels
Cons: limited replay value, only one mode of play
The Bottom Line: Simply and challenging, but ultimately short.
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| kjell1979's Full Review: Spikey's Bounce Around for iPhone |
Spikey's Bounce Around was the third game out of the three free games available the other weekend from Donut Games. Out of the three, my first impression was that this one was going to be the worst out of the three. In the end I warmed up quite a bit to Spikey's Bounce Around, but despite its pluses in the end this game still managed to disappoint in some areas.
Gameplay
The goal of Spikey's Bounce Around is to free butterflies from their glass jar prisons. You control a spherical character with spikes and giant eyes called Spikey. He sticks to walls and other surfaces while cuts through leaves and bounces off springboards. When trying to free butterflies, the jars have to fall all the way to the floor or a platform. You have to worry about them getting stuck in more leaves and brush.
Spikey's Bounce Around is made up of 50 stages. Each stage has a variable number of jars you need to free as well as enemies and obstacles to avoid. You also have a variable number of times you can propel Spikey off a wall or other surface he sticks to. The less launches you use to free all the butterflies, the more points you get. As the levels progress, the harder it is to complete your objective. Eventually you're presented with harder enemies like spiked balls or wasps who chase Spikey after being freed from their own respective jar.
You’re measured by the score you can achieve for each level. You score falls into one of 3 tiers. The first tier starts with any score you get for freeing all the butterflies in a stage. You get points for clearing brush as well as not using launches. You also get combo bonuses for more brushes you hit on a single launch.
The difficulty is the main factor in with solving these puzzles. On easier levels the biggest challenge is maximizing your score. It's pretty easy to free all the butterflies given the generous amount of re-launches. On later levels it's quite a challenge to simply free the butterflies or avoid enemies. In levels with wasps and moving spiked balls you have to also act quickly in addition to precisely. The springboards factor in greatly to the gameplay and randomness of the levels. In these levels there seems to be some luck that factors into the way Spikey bounces. After a dozen or two bounces you're at the mercy of the environment to direct Spikey. Thus you must be very precise with your direction to complete the level.
Overall the gameplay is pretty solid. It provides a decent challenge and a enough control over Spikey to provide an enjoyable experience. There are plenty of stages to go through. Still even with 50 different stages there is a noticeable absence of modes as compared to other titles from Donut Games. But despite the lack of modes, the gameplay is still very solid and strong.
Controls
The controls in Spikey's Bounce Around are pretty simple and straightforward. You use the touch screen to indicate a direction in which to propel Spikey around the level. The directions are pretty diverse in that it's not a small handful of directions but very minor directional changes can yield quite different results especially on later levels. If a direction is unattainable the directional arrow turns from white to red, which is a nice touch. Finally, while you can control Spikey's direction you cannot control his velocity. This would have come in handy for certain levels when you're trying to avoid spiked mines and wasps.
Graphics
The graphics are very well done. The graphics are bright and take on a cartoony nature. As Spikey travels across the screen he leaves circles and other sparkles in his wake. The enemies and traps also are colorful and easily recognizable. When it comes to animation and framerate, there isn't much slowdown at all. Everything seems to flow well. Still, there isn't much movement on the screen, but there can be a little bit when Spikey is moving at a high rate and there are butterflies, spikes, and wasps flying around as well. Overall the graphics do a good job of providing a good looking stages and animations while avoiding annoying aspects like slowdown and choppiness. The graphics are clearly one of the best aspects of this game.
Sound
The audio in Spikey's Bound Around is also pretty good. Like the other titles from Donut Games, this one has about 3 different themes which play during the levels. These themes are light up-tempo melodies which can be catchy and fit in well with the theme of the game. For some these themes might not be that good or even annoying, but I found the music to be pleasant and enjoyable to listen to.
The sound effects also have that same arcade-like feeling when you hear them. The spring sound when Spikey hits a springboard, leaf shuffling when you clear out some leaves or brush, and glass smashing when one of the jars hits the ground, all are perfect picks as sound effects for this game. The default volume settings are also set just right such that these sounds aren't too loud to drown out the music or too shrill such that they hurt your ears. Overall the audio in Spikey's Bounce Around is above average, especially for such a cheap title.
Replay Value
There isn't much replay value in Spikey's Bounce Around. The replay value entirely consists of trying to beat your best score on each of the 50 levels. Still, these levels have a finite amount of points you can acquire in a given level such that once you achieve the highest scoring plateau it might not even be possible to get a better score. Also there are some levels where I can't even imagine getting any score other than the highest tier. I think that most people will put this game down once they finish each of the 50 levels and that's it. Others will revisit certain levels to try and get the best scores they can. However, there isn't much more than a few hours of value here. It took me about 4 to 6 hours to get the highest tier on all the levels which is how much time will be spent by most people.
Overall Spikey's Bounce Around is a solid title with some decent gameplay. The lack of replay value will definitely turn off a lot of people. There are plenty of 99 cent games out there that will occupy more of your time. I think that for people who are puzzle game fans or casual game fans should give this game a try. The controls are simple and the many of the early levels are easy enough to get into. The later levels will prove frustrating for many folks because you'll have to set the perfect angle for Spikey. In the end I would recommend this title, but not as enthusiastically as other titles that are out there.
Recommended:
Yes
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Epinions.com ID:
kjell1979
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Location: Oxford, Mass
Reviews written: 279
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Still plowing through iPhone games.
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