Universal Review 
Podgamer Recommended
Twist And Shoot
by Craig Grannell (October 4th, 2010 at 6:24 pm) WITH SPECIAL GUEST STARS
Game: Blue Defense: Second Wave. Publisher: Cat-In-A-Box. Price: £1.19. Buy the game
Space Invaders was the first arcade game I remember playing. Due to my tender age, my dad had to lift me up to see the screen properly, something he instantly regretted, not least because I rapidly became hooked and I weighed quite a bit more than he realised.
These days, I find Space Invaders about as much fun as being sandpapered, and so I’m not a big fan of Taito’s serviceable ports for iPhone/iPod touch and iPad. The original Blue Defense was a different matter, its glorious twisty neon destruction rekindling the spark that had ignited when I was a kid. And the amusingly short instructions also helped: “Tilt to aim. Bullets shoot straight up”.
Now Blue Defense has got its ‘second wave’—and I’m hooked again.
Die, alien slime!
Second Wave doesn’t mess with the formula that made the original Blue Defense a minor early App Store shooty classic. You’re still being attacked by myriad alien scumbags, many of which look unnervingly like neon sperm. And you’re still based on a blue planet that’s decided against building ships of its own, instead pooling resources into constructing a ridiculously large laser gun to fend off invaders. And, yes, bullets still shoot straight up, with you tilting your device like a maniac to aim.
Along with new levels and iPad support (number of iPad drops during testing: two), Second Wave fixes some of its predecessor’s shortcomings: a baffling lack of calibration, which turned Blue Defense into ‘bullets shoot slightly sideways’ on my iPhone; frame-rate issues; and the inability to react quickly enough to enemies sneaking up behind you.
The last of those things is dealt with by new weapons. One is a touch-based target, which you can use to sweep across neon fiends, or lock on to specific targets while you get on with tilt-based destruction elsewhere (although this splits and therefore halves your laser’s effectiveness). There’s also a ‘planet cannon’ that obliterates everything in its path, and in true ‘classic arcade game’ fashion, it must be used sparingly, because you only get three shots.
"No."
Second Wave isn’t without its shortcomings. The music is annoying and repetitive (and the game lacks iPod support), some levels are insanely difficult, and the twist mechanic might irritate some people, not least when their device flies across the room during a particularly frenzied effort to repel an all-directions assault by glowing spunk. There’s also the nagging feeling if you’ve played Blue Defense that this is more Blue Defense 1.5 than an outright sequel. However, for your not-very-much-money, Second Wave gives you more of the same, only better, and Blue Defense was great in the first place; for that reason, it scrapes a Podgamer recommendation.
Posted by Craig Grannell on October 4th, 2010 at 6:24 pm
in Reviews, iPod Touch and iPhone, iPad
Podgamer Postscript RevStu says
Not from me. Weirdly, Craig has neglected to mention that the rotate-your-iPod control that made the first game such a chore can be completely done away with in the sequel in favour of all-touch controls, which is a significant improvement. But it doesn’t do much for the same old massively-shallow gameplay, which relies for most of its challenge on simply overwhelming you with enemy numbers within five or six levels. It’s hard to see where you’re meant to employ much skill or strategy or find much fun – just robotically shoot whatever’s nearest the planet at any given moment. It’s lovely looking, but for gameplay sophistication and enjoyment I’ll still take Space Invaders any day.
Craig says
As ‘juv3nal’ notes in the comments, the strategy comes in picking off the motherships, balancing your firepower between nuking them and blowing up the little guys they send towards you (which, I guess, makes it a little like Galaga). And given that you’re generally a much better gamer than I am, I can’t imagine you got made on level six—on my first go, I got to about level 14.
RevStu says
Well, obviously I’m shooting the motherships too when the opportunity arises, or having an auto-laser fire at them while I sweep up the little ones. But the essential point is still the same – you’ve got to shoot everything sooner or later, and you get swamped far too fast. (Also, my “first go” was in that weird semi-tutorial opening game which I don’t think starts on wave 1. My first proper from-the-start game cleared 13 waves and 1678 kills, according to the high-score table. So ner.)
RevStu adds
Okay, had a second go and cleared 34 waves, but I still never felt I was using any skill beyond following the bleeding obvious – if the planet’s in imminent danger shoot whatever’s there, and if it isn’t shoot the biggest thing in the sky. (The only thing that was different was that I realised the big things that land on the planet don’t do it any immediate harm, so I didn’t have to panic and cannon them. I also noticed that you don’t get the same waves every game, so it’s hard to really compare scores anyway.)
And when I did finally get killed, it was still just because one wave was suddenly swamped from all sides at once at close range. It wasn’t so much a difficulty curve as a right angle. I don’t hate the game by any means, but for me it’d be a 5 or a 6 depending on how good a mood I was in, which is obviously a far cry from the score Craig’s given it.
“which relies for most of its challenge on simply overwhelming you with enemy numbers within five or six levels. It’s hard to see where you’re meant to employ much skill or strategy or find much fun – just robotically shoot whatever’s nearest the planet at any given moment”
There’s your problem. If you just shoot whatever’s nearest then you aren’t taking out the bigger thing sitting further back that infinitely spawns little dudes.
I really like it. It does feel somewhat ambienty for the most part but then I’m one of those folks that like that. It does look fabulous and playing on the iPad with both hands directing dual lasers does feel quite a lot like sci-fi. Gauntlet mode seems to be where some score attacking can be tried, the risk/reward there seems to be how long you can milk the spores before taking out the motherships. Get over cocky and it’s curtains. But for a Universal app with different modes, lovely visuals and good touch controls I personally thought 99c/59p was well worth it. Gonna try Stu’s more retro alternative too, good find.
It does sound like it would be more fun on the iPad, especially with the extra space meaning your finger(s) obscured less stuff. But I still find it a bit cold and uninvolving.
On the iPad I’ve just discovered (by accident) you can have as many lasers going as you have fingers.