Chaz
Jungle Blocks is one of the latest Arkanoid/Brick Breaker clones to hit the Indie Games Channel, created by Danny Tuppeny. The game is currently priced at 80msp's (200 at the time of this review) and contains Singleplayer, Local Cooperative, High Score Leaderboards and 15 levels.
Jungle Blocks gives off a good first impression with top notch presentation overall thanks to it's well drawn background graphics, 'funky' charming music, a warm colour palette and a menu which is simple yet well designed. Once you are in the game the aim is straight forward - clear the screen of bricks by using a paddle and a ball. Sadly the game does not take this a step further and offer much depth with the use of powerups. However rather than the usual idea of 'lives' Jungle Blocks uses points to keep you alive. Upon missing the ball you will loose 20 points; when the points counter hits zero you loose. Although this appears like an interesting idea to try and spice up the old-school gameplay concepts of Arkanoid it is also rather flawed. When a player has made only 2-3 shots they should have gained a fair amount of points to keep them alive for long enough to increase their score far beyond the point where its possible to die, which means players only have to be careful at the beginning of each level.
The games 15 levels should take you around 30 minutes to play through. However by the latter few levels the game's flaws will start to hit home. The hit detection on the paddle is non-existant at the sides, meaning the ball can move through the bat rather often. This creates almost a line on the top of the paddle where the ball is 'allowed' to hit, which soon begins to get frustrating. Also the paddles movement is much too sensitive to the point where small incremental movements are just simply not possible. I found myself actually letting the ball purposely miss towards the end of a level so that I could fire it directly upwards to hit the final brick.
Local Cooperative play is actually a very interesting addition to the game, as it truly is 'cooperative'. Each player's paddle can only move in one half of the screen, meaning the two must genuinely work together to keep the ball up in the air - a smart design choice. Sadly however this is not playable online.
Overall I enjoyed my time with Jungle Blocks. Despite it's flaws the game still stays relatively addictive and racking up a 31x multiplier is extremely satisfying. The game almost feels like a demo of what could be done if the developer was to patch it or bring out a sequel. Fixing the hit detection on the paddle would probably result in the game being too easy with the current 'life' mechanic, which makes me feel it would be a better idea to bring back the old-school concept of lives so that the hit detection can be sorted without negative consequence. Also tuning the paddle's movement would help alot.
I would love to see more variety in the game overall - more levels, music and different backgrounds. At 200 points it's hard to recommend Jungle Blocks to anyone other than those itching for more Arkanoid, when other games on the service offer the same features and more for 80 points. I definitely think if the developer was to lower the price to 80 points, and sort out the little mechanical issues then Jungle Blocks would be worth a look - as it will keep you entertained for a short period of time with its charming music and colourful style along with providing some good laughs on coop.
Strite
I’m quite a fan of Arkanoid type games and I’ve played many over the years.
After starting up Jungle Blocks I was greeted by a colourful and well presented title screen and a catchy, cheery tune. Good first impressions, I selected single player and started the first of the fifteen single player levels.
The levels are quite well presented, with a nice static jungle themed background and smooth colourful bricks. The bricks are Yellow (Which give 30 points) Green (Which give 20 points) and Orange (10 points). The first ‘gripe’ I found with the game was the colour of the paddle and the ball, both are black. It’s only a small gripe but in such a colourful and cheerful game it kind of stands out a lot.
I overlooked my issue with the paddle colour however and got stuck into the first level and that’s when more of the games issues became apparent. The hit detection on the paddle is just plain bad and you’ll notice the ball actually going through the paddle more and more often, on top of that the paddle is just ridiculously sensitive which makes moving the paddle more of a chore than a pleasure.
I imagine both of these issues could be fixed relatively easily. Assigning a button on the controller which, when held, would make the paddle move slower would have fixed the second issue and there are plenty of unused buttons that this mechanic could have been mapped to.
As the game progresses you realise that Jungle Blocks just doesn’t really change much from level to level, the layout of the blocks change but the originally cheerful music simply loops and soon starts to grind and the Background just does not change at all through the fifteen single player levels. Again these are simply cosmetic issues that I personally found with the game, I just can’t see how hard it can be to change a static background for each level, or even every 2-3 levels.
All in all, Jungle Blocks offers some simple and addictive block busting gameplay, but a couple of the games broken mechanics and the overall repetitiveness let it down, taking that into account alongside the price (200MSP’s) make Jungle Blocks a hard game to recommend.
Jungle Blocks Gets an Official Indie 2.5/5
Update - The developer has since dropped the price of the game to 80 points!