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Review

A rock and a really hard place

by RevStu (October 22nd, 2010 at 10:40 am)

While most of the attacks aimed at the iOS platforms by “traditional” gaming fans about the limitations of the touch-screen interface are ignorant, ill-informed and just plain wrong, there ARE still a few game types for which the system isn’t very well suited. One of them is the horizontally-scrolling shooter. The basic nature of the genre almost inevitably means that significant portions of the screen are always going to be obscured by one or more of the player’s digits, and even the best attempts at getting around the problem to date (most notably EA’s very thoughtful approach to R-Type) still suffer a little.

The dilemma faced by developers attempting to bring the sideways shmup to the iOS machines is well illustrated by Cell War (£1.19/€1,59/$1.99, Lite version).

It’s not as if TipCat (the developers in question on this occasion) haven’t tried. The game – which most closely resembles the Gradius series in design – offers both tilt and touch control options, and makes various concessions in the name of playability (such as bonus collectables homing in on your ship) but neither method really works out satisfactorily. Which is a great shame, as otherwise it’s an accomplished little game that would be very enjoyable if the controls didn’t stack the odds against you so severely.

Each system has its own flaws. The tilt method is well-executed in so far as the actual movement goes, with sensitivity and calibration options enabling you to move your ship around smoothly and accurately. Unfortunately, you also have a missile attack which necessitates stabbing all over the screen with your thumbs, if anything obscuring more of the screen than with the virtual-joypad method.

(Alternatively you can hold the iPod uncomfortably in one hand in order to use a finger instead, but that makes steering much harder, not least because without a two-handed grip you’re also wobbling it around with every missile you fire.)

The touch controls, meanwhile, are flawed by the use of a fixed virtual pad rather than the relative ones seen in the likes of Espgaluda 2 and Space Invaders Infinity Gene. If your ship is anywhere in the bottom-left quarter of the screen, the chances are it’s going to be completely hidden by your big fat thumb, making dodging any bullets, enemies or landscape features a lottery unless you totally avoid the whole area, which can’t always be done. Also, the method of firing missiles when using touch controls, while inventive, is vague and inaccurate.

The game itself makes few compromises in the face of such interface challenges. Your ship has a five-point energy bar, autofires its main cannon/laser weapons and is equipped with an easy-to-trigger (though not very powerful) shockwave attack, but that’s about it. It starts pulling dirty tricks – like enemies attacking from behind you – from pretty early on, and most horribly, dying sees all your accumulated power-ups stripped away, leaving you with little chance against the bosses of later levels.

I’ve never understood the point of doing this in games with multiple lives – if losing my first ship anywhere after Level 2 is effectively going to end my chances of success, then bloody well only give me one ship. And it’s a real pity, because the levels themselves are interesting and the feel of the game when you CAN see what’s happening is very nice indeed.

Horizontal shooters are in short supply on the App Store, presumably because of the difficulties in doing them well. But Cell War is very nearly a really good game. A relative joypad and a tiny bit more thought with regard to the controls would turn it into something heartily worthwhile. Right now, all it’s good for is serving as a warning to other developers about how hard it is to do this sort of game well on the iOS platforms, and as ammunition for the format’s detractors.

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