Review
It’s A Kind Of Tragic
by Craig Grannell (October 5th, 2010 at 12:00 pm)
Game: Magic Gem. Publisher: WuZla. Price: £1.19. Buy this game
SECRET TRANSCRIPT OF PHONE CONVERSATION AT MAGIC GEM DEV HQ.
Uh, yeah, hey boss! Yeah, we’re getting there… almost done. Yeah, it’s just like you wanted—a Zoo Keeper clone with a pirate theme. No, we couldn’t get Johnny Depp to endorse it, but Adam Ant said he’d appear on the title screen for 50 quid and a box of Monster Munch.
Not very magical.
Oh, you really only called to say you want some changes? But we’re almost ready to ship the game! Who’s boss? Well… I… You really want me to answer that? I… OK… You’re the boss. Sir. You’re the boss, sir…
Hang on, I’ll just get a pen… OK, fire away… You’re not sure about the sound effects? But we got that musician in and everything. Yes, I know your wife likes harps, but… Sorry? You want to hear a harp-strum every time someone makes a match? And you’ve sent me an MP3? OK, I’ll open it…
…
…
Sir, I’m really not sure about this. The game’s got no music, and so the effects are everything. This sound’s going to drive players bonkers, and I—
Sorry, sir. You’re the boss. Yes, I know. No, I don’t want to go back to waiting tables at the diner. OK, we’ll sort it. Sorry? The colours? Yes, they’re very nice. No, I don’t think there are too many of them. Right. Uh-huh. But if we remove two of the colours from most of the game modes, gamers will be able to play forever. They’ll get massive scores but no sense of achievement. They’ll just get bored and—
…
Really? To counter that, you want to make the ‘task mode’ where you have to match specific shapes at least ten times harder? Ten times? Not just a little bit?
Sir, I really feel quite strongly about this. We have this great little Zoo Keeper clone, which is better than the other games doing this kind of thing on the App Store. If we mess up the sound and the difficulty level to this degree, Magic Gem will be a missed opportunity.
Yeah. Uh-huh. Sure. I…
…
You’re the boss.
SFX: GUNSHOT.
SFX: THUD.
SFX: LOTS OF ZOO KEEPER FANS GOING “WHY THE HELL DID THEY MESS UP THIS GAME AND WHAT’S WITH THE DAMN HARP NOISES?”
Which once more makes me ask the question “WHERE IS ZOOKEEPER?”
Someone give me Zookeeper without Quest Mode and I’ll love them for life.
Actually, scratch that. The missus will steal my iPod.
Maybe Ignition signed a contract roughly along the lines of: “If you ever release Zoo Keeper for any other platform, we will kill you to death. You already annoyed us with Zooo on the PS2. Don’t do it again. Or else.”
Bejeweled Blitz is pretty similar to Zoo Keeper in terms of speed, for what it’s worth, although PopCap broke it will nasty ‘pay for cheats’ on Facebook.
Ah that’s why you were complaining, but people in YOUR friend’s list surely wouldn’t do that, would they?
What, pay for cheats? Absolutely. You don’t have to spend real cash money—you grab them with bonuses. The problem is that it makes a mockery of the high-score tables, because you’re not starting on anything like a level playing field. I’ve done this myself: I can usually average around 200,000 on Blitz, maybe getting up to 400,000 on very rare occasions. With a few boosts, 400,000 is pretty easy within two goes.
Still, if you want high scores, try Magic Gem. I actually gave up on one game after about a half-hour, because it was clear it would never end, and it was boring me to death.
I’m planning a little roundup of the few non-shit match-three games shortly. particularly with reference to the “games going on forever” issue. STAND BY.
Something called “Piyo Blocks 2″ is on sale at the mo for £0.59/ €0.79/ $0.99 — it looks kind of Zookeeperish, and the iTunes description is ringing Zookeeper bells for me. I don’t like what they’ve replaced the animals with, though: some kind of dull, charmless, anthropomorphic block. Yeah, “block”. Apart from the colour, they all look exactly the same.
Don’t suppose it features in that upcoming roundup, RevStu?
SSSHHHHH!
(Yes, it does.)
Piyo Blocks 2 plays and looks a lot like Zookeeper. This is a Good Thing.