Game Critique #2: Hedgehog Launch

Let me start by saying something's wonky with the view counter.  I highly doubt I have a small following in the Ukraine.  That would be interesting, but statistically unlikely.

Today I continue critiquing games...

Hedgehog Launch
Made by Armor Games

Premise: You live on a small island nation that looks a lot like suburbia.  The government has elected you as the new head of their fledgeling space program.  The catch -- they can only give you $50 to start and they want you to use the national mammal, a variety of hedgehog.

The controls are pretty easy to learn as they only use the arrow keys and the mouse.  You launch the hedgehog with a slingshot and steer it around the sky with the left and right (and later up) keys and try to collect as many coins as possible to fund your upgrades.  Randomly placed platforms are provided to bounce off of and achieve more air-time.  Upgrades include better launcher, more efficient/powerful jet pack, secondary rockets to go higher, parachute to slow the hedgehog's decent, a radar to detect platforms, and cute little goggles for the hedgehog to wear as it zooms across the sky.

Which brings me to what I like about this game.  First and foremost, it's cute.  I was wary at first about the "launching hedgehogs into the air" thing because I don't enjoy seeing small vertebrates getting hurt.  However there is no "splat" at the end of this game (though there may be a shooting star) and for all appearances the hedgehog seems to be having as much fun with this adventure as you are.  Secondly, the soundtrack rocks out, which turns a relatively silly game into and awesome game.  After all, you are playing with jet-packs.

The platform radar is my only real frustration in this game.  It is very handy to have, but doesn't always show platform placement accurately, particularly when near the ground.  It's also requires taking your eyes off the main playing screen momentarily, effecting one's ability to aim at said platforms.  Nonetheless, I found myself missing the platform radar when I replayed the game, so it is a helpful feature.

Hedgehog Launch is also a very short game (takes about 10 - 15 minutes to complete), but that's not really a problem as it lends itself very well to replay and attempts at beating your previous high score.

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Earworm of the day (provided you don't get the Hedgehog Launch b.g. music stuck first): Save Your Life by Newsboys

Game Critique 1: Elephant Quest

I recently signed up for a site called Kongregate which has lots of free computer games from various companies and is generally all around fun.  It's possible to play games without an account, but having an account allows you to save your games and achievements.

Having had a basic education in game design, I can't help but try to see beyond the graphics and puzzle out what makes these games so darn addictive.  So here's my two cents on one:

Elephant Quest:
Made by Armor Games.

This game is adorableness armed with laser cannons.  You're a small blue elephant.  Your hat got stolen by a big purple woolly mammoth and now you want it back.  To do so, you have to brave a maze of levels inhabited by hordes of strange monsters and complete quests from other elephants to get upgrades so you can face Woolly in the final showdown without getting trampled to death.

Though you will get killed repeatedly, you also have an infinite number of lives.  The rooms can be visited as many times as needed and the monsters are always there exactly the same as before.  This may seem like an annoyance at first, but becomes essential at the end.  Just completing the quests and beating all the rooms is not enough to beat Woolly.  I'm not familiar with gamer terminology, but I believe this is called "level grinding".

The level map is laid out in a easy-to-navigate spiderweb, if such a thing is possible of existing.  The level-up is the real unusual part because it's graphical.  You start at the center and collect the increments sequentially through a virtual maze.  There are 5 categories for upgrade points: intelligence, agility, endurance, charisma, and HP.  Except for HP, the upgrade points can be spent on upgrades like weapons and jump height and little elephant fairies that deal damage to nearby enemies (and they're so very cute).  Complicated?  Yes.  It took me a while to figure out how it all worked.

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Earworm for the day: Emperata Overture