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Reviewing this game is difficult. Quite simply I have been a fan of the Prince of Persia games since the very beginning and as such have laid my hands on every iteration I could get hold of. The reboot of the series that started with the Sands of Time kicked off a series that I still play to this day and will always be held with reverence and love. The next reboot, the cel-shaded, one on one combat adventure simply titled Prince of Persia was supposed to be a return to the original roots of the series but fans dismissed it as too easy and didn’t like the fact that you couldn’t ever die. The tone was right but the execution was off and fans weren’t sure what to expect next. Well they probably didn’t expect this…

Prince of Persia: The Forgotten Sands is a return to the Sands of Time trilogy set in between Sands and Warrior Within and actually has nothing to do with the recently released Sands of Time movie. The game starts out with a beautifully rendered scene of the Prince scampering across rooftops and leaping between falling towers as he gets to his brothers palace only to find it under siege by a huge army of assailants. He rushes to his brother’s aid and learns that he is planning on releasing King Solomon’s army, a mystical force that can end the world unless properly harnessed and the Prince’s brother Malek feels he is the man for the job. What a cock. Faster than you can say Sand Zombie Apocalypse he’s let loose huge hoards of monsties for you to leap over, slice up and generally batter the crap out of. You are then granted mystical powers of your own by the Djinn (that’s basically elemental genies to you and me) and are soon able to freeze water to use as platforms, recall broken sections of wall and floor and the favourite: Rewind time so you can have another crack at a series of traps or avoid death entirely.

So then, it’s a return to old stylings: Mixing platforming and combat to progress through a huge kingdom to achieve your ultimate goal of saving the world. Even the original voice actor from Sands is back for this outing and this game really does feel like a return to the Prince we all know and love. The parkour is the best it has ever been. It retains all the best moves from the previous titles and throws in a couple more (even if Isaac Newton would have a thing or two to say about the physics of some of them – landing on a vertical surface and still being able to run two metres straight up? Hmm…) and caters for veteran Persia players by stringing together some ridiculous runs and throwing some nice puzzles into the mix.

One disappointment is the combat. There’s nothing really wrong with it but it seems to be lacking a certain flair to it. The combat engine is the same Tag Fighting Technology that powered Arkham Asylum but the system doesn’t work as well here. Prince of Persia games have always revolved around blocking, countering and mixing the agile Prince’s acrobatic skills for visual flair as much as combat efficiency and only one of three of these has made it through here.

You can’t block and you can’t counter. It took me a long while to adjust to this, as an updated version of the original engine had also been the basis for Assassin’s Creed’s combat. This in turn though is probably why the same system wasn’t used here. It’s been used for five games already (soon to be six with Assassin’s Creed: Brotherhood on the way later this year) so clearly Ubisoft wanted something new for this outing. This is a real shame though because the combat in Warrior Within was the pinnacle for any of these games (Assassin’s Creed included) and the series seems unable to better it. Even Two Thrones lost some of the visceral brutishness of Warrior that detracted from it as it was a system designed around a darker, more violent Prince. The change in tone for Thrones left it feeling almost censored as blood and dismemberment were removed (even though some truly nasty stealth kills were thrown in – Consistency Ubisoft! Consistency!)

What we get is rhythm based and context sensitive combat. You have a basic sword swipe that can also be charged; a dodge move, a kick/shove attack to knock back enemies and a leap move that lets you bounce about enemies heads and attack from above. There is also magic you can use for protection, crowd clearance, setting people on fire and attacking from a distance that mix in well if not brilliantly (the fully levelled up Whirlwind attack is a thing of beauty).

You can also run along walls and leap about mid combat to avoid your enemies and hell you’re gonna want to. To compensate for the simplified combat you get up to a rather sphincter tightening 50 enemies on screen at once. The enemies are unfortunately clones of each other and do look and attack identically to each other and the larger enemies all use the exact same attack pattern as the Titans from Arkham Asylum. That’s just lazy. The bad guys are all very pretty though (the huge Elephant mini boss is a particular favourite) and once the fights begin incorporating all types of foe your tactics and timing really are put to the test and it really does get very satisfying. There’s an achievement for killing 50 enemies without taking a hit and it is a great feeling when you nail it.

What you are left with is a very satisfying experience but it’s not one that’s going to appeal to everybody. The pace and setting aren’t as intense as the Sands trilogy but not as relaxed as the most recent cartoony Nolan North adventure. It’s retained the difficulty of the previous trilogy though and the new approach to the powers keeps things fresh enough that this never stoops to the quick, cheap cash in it could have been. The platforming really is an absolute pleasure and you can, if you know which way you’re going, blast through huge sections of pitfalls, column jumps and magic induced scenery changes without even slowing to a walk and with enemies thrown in at random points along the way the challenge to take down the enemy without breaking stride is always a welcome one. I immediately started up again after finishing the game as I couldn’t wait to try and get through this as quickly and smoothly as possible on a second run with prior knowledge of the layout.

If you like your adventures fast, pretty and full of that Arabian Adventure feel then you’re going to be right at home with this Prince and this hopefully marks the beginning of another trilogy is this Prince’s universe, although I’m still eager to find out what’s happening in the other Prince’s world. Two concurrent Prince of Persia storylines? That might be a little much to expect but I can’t wait to see what happens next…

I promised myself when I started to write these reviews that I wouldn’t lower myself to using casual profanity and inappropriate humour to describe any game no matter how infuriating or bad it was. This leaves in something of a quandary as unfortunately there is no other way to describe this adult nappy shit stain of a game.

The story is the most boring, generic good-cop-gone-bad-cos-the-dad-that-loved-you-was-too-fucking-dumb-to-duck (seriously, watch the cut scene where his dad croaks and try not to haemorrhage laughing) story you’ve ever seen. Your character Jack Slate (yes REALLY) is an alcoholic borderline psychopath with a badge and it’s up to you to direct his homicidal tendencies towards thuggish morons who all frequent the same clothes shop. In true fashion police style, the snazzier the outfit the more armour the guy’s packing.

The baddies are pretty accurate with their guns, which is just as well considering they’re all apparently special needs henchman, clearly following this line of work because beating people and murder are easier than maths and… y’know… speaking to people. All they ever seem to do is stay in cover or run right at you. That’s it. No flanking, no moving in groups, no team interactions, nothing, nada, zip. They are the very epitome of walking meat sacks. Coma patients with guns. Tooled up vegetables. You get the idea.

So is there anything good here? Sort of. But nothing that lasts. The gameplay is a mix of cover shooter and brawler and it rams a four-foot failure phallus up the arse of both. You’ll frequently run past cover points only to get gunned down, your aim is hugely inaccurate (perhaps a reference to Jack’s alcoholism and thus inability to shoot anything further from him than the barrel of his gun) and the brawling is as enthralling as a cuddle fight with a Downs patient. I wouldn’t mind so much but this is a Namco game. These are the guys that brought us Soul Calibur and Tekken for Christ’s sake! Cover shooter side they gave us Kill.Switch (if you don’t know it, find it and play it – without it you wouldn’t have Gears of War) which was tight, responsive and had some truly great gun battle set-pieces. What the FUCK happened here? To make things worse this is a franchise reboot. They did this game on Xbox and PS2 years ago and it was much better then, even with crap-for-day graphics and no enemy AI at all. This series of games has gotten worse with each instalment. A real shame considering the first game actually wasn’t too shabby.

The only things to compliment here are the takedowns and the disarms, the series’ speciality. Once you’ve flailed wildly at a bad guy for long enough a prompt appears and you can tap the A button and one of two glorious things happens: a) Jack grabs the gun of his assailant and wrenches it away from them and as they float back up from the startling surprise of being disarmed by a sentient being their head will automatically land right in the middle of your crosshair and tapping the right trigger lands a perfect headshot. b) Jack will perform a finishing melee flurry that makes UFC look like a tickling competition. Throats are kicked, necks are snapped and groins are wrenched (or eaten if you’re playing one of the so-called stealth doggy sections) in some of the most over the top violence since Ike and Tina Turner. These actually do create a genuine feeling of joy, if only for the fact that it makes you wonder if the protagonist is as pissed off as you are at the CGI fuckwits standing between you and the end credits/instant trade in, but it doesn’t last. Even with weapon takedowns thrown in and even more violent takedowns as a result the novelty wears off.

Then there are the dog sections. Oh jesus. You “sneak” around biting people. That’s it. If you hold a button you can see the heartbeat of the sap you’re about to annihilate. That’s it. If you get spotted, run around for a bit and then just charge at them. Honestly some of the most boring and mundane gameplay I have ever faced. And I’ve played Brittany’s Dance Beat (don’t judge me).

So what you are left with is a steaming pile of gaming crap. You’ll probably enjoy the first half hour of play and then you’ll quickly realise that that’s all this game has to offer. Warehouse after bloody warehouse of running, flailing, and setting your dog on people with levels of violence that are just silly, rather than fun. Probably why we never saw a demo of this crock because if you could get one then you’d save yourself forty quid by just changing your own personal level of intoxication before each play through and bam. That’s the game. Just avoid it. It’s easier.

Every now and then a game will throw at you a set piece that’ll stay with you long after you stop playing it. In Gears of War it was either the moment the Kryll first spiralled across the moon or the Corpser appearing in front of you and dropping down to block your path. The battle with the Hydra, at the opening of God of War. The first toppling of a giant in Shadow of the Colossus. The battle with the Dahaka at the end of Prince of Persia: Warrior Within. Or the gigantic worm on level 3 of Lost Planet. I do love giant worms.

Ah, Lost Planet. When it first arrived it was loved for a short while but then vanished into sea of distant hardcore online gamers and not a lot else. The setup was simple: Shoot really big things with really big guns. Or climb into a robot suit with even bigger guns and shoot even bigger bugs. In the snow. And shoot people and people in robot suits too. Fun! Problem was, it had fiddly controls and the main character Wayne was a namby-bamby baby girl that ran like he had a weeks worth of crap in his snow pants.

The sequel takes place ten years after the non-eventful events of the first game on the same Lost Planet of E.D.N.3. The bugs are still everywhere and evil corporation NEVEC are still plundering for Thermal Energy, a hot lava-like goo that powers everything and is treated like it’s rare as rocking horse shit despite the fact it’s absolutely everywhere, which seems to imply that in the last game we achieved absolutely sweet FA. Except!!! Due to a massive release of even more really rare Thermal Energy pockets of the frozen planet have turned from glacial apocalyptic wasteland to thriving jungles, rocky mountains and vast deserts with each scenario featuring a different squad of soldiers.

It’s amazing how much of a difference a simple change of scenery can make with a game like this. The repetitive scenery was a bane to the first game and the freshness for each chapter here really helps proceedings. As does the fact that you can move slightly faster this time round. It’s not much faster but the character is at least moving quickly enough that when you’re trying to run away from the thirty foot armour plated creepy that’s smacking you around.

The guns and explosions are as impressive as ever. Really, gloriously over the top light shows of destructive glory that Michael Bay would be jealous of. Even the basic machine gun makes you feel like a man with every trigger squeeze. The sniper rifle has been refined and is one of the most satisfying guns in the game. Each snappy headshot provokes a sly grin and the new grenade launcher is a real treat.

The whole package just seems faster paced this time round. The waves come thicker and faster and rather than throw so many Akrid (giant bugs to the uninitiated) at you that you’re bored of them by level 4, Capcom mix it up a lot more with larger soldier encounters meaning that the Akrid assaults feel much more eventful. If you have any interest in this game you’re probably already aware of the train-in-the-desert-level featuring a giant worm. Allow me to assure you that a) that level is awesome and b) you’ll want to play it more than once. The worm in question would use the worm from the first game as dental floss and the giant worms from Dune as a tampon. It’s MASSIVE. So massive it would be foolish for one person to tackle alone. The best bit is… you don’t have to.

The campaign is now playable with 4 player co-op online and splitscreen and hellz to the yeah cause a bug blasting four-way turns out to be some of the best fun you can have on an Xbox. Chatting to total strangers about how exactly you’re going to down a 6000 tonne salamander are hilarious over the headsets and saving a team mate at the last second with a well placed shotgun blast feels like a moment from Starship Troopers every time and you can even share Thermal Energy between you to add to the whole feeling of camaraderie. (Thermal Energy also powers Harmonisers, devices that give the wearer superhuman regenerative abilities).

So everything has pretty much improved for this instalment. The VS’s (robot suits) are shinier, bigger and better and the enemies are much more varied (I love the new panther style Akrid that adjust their balance and movement based on how many limbs they have left! Sweeeeet!!!) the bosses are the biggest you’ve ever fought (No the Reaper in Mass Effect doesn’t count and I still haven’t played God of War III yet so that doesn’t count either – yes I’m bitter) and some of the set pieces are truly epic. The only niggles are that some of the boss fights take too long. Unless you’re playing with three other humans and not the surprisingly tolerable AI the larger creatures can take anything up to half an hour to kill and this ends up just feeling like a grind. The controls are still a little fiddly (they’re essentially exactly the same) and there is a certain amount of repetition after extended sessions of play.

Overall though this really is a great improvement over the original. The multiplayer is still great, there’s more variety in the levels and set pieces, the co-op adds a great new flair to an already winning formula. Some people may get narked off by the simplistic gameplay and the longer boss battles but this really is a great quality game full of great moments that it’d be a shame if you didn’t give it a go. Get your guns on and go hunt some bugs!

Archipelago is a beautifully simple real time strategy game, which has been boiled down into a puzzle format. I love the complexities a full-blown RTS but a mobile phone screen is not the place to reenact Age of Empire however Archipelago feels like it has a perfect balance. Does Archipelago stand out as a good example of games for the Android market?

Essentially Archipelago has the feeling of Risk with islands and planes but a difference is that It has no dice or turns, which makes it hugely addictive and the fact that you don’t have to wait ages for the other person to move their pieces after tussling with their inner-self wherever it’s politically wrong to take over Madagascar. With lots of small maps and fast action, the “one more go” mentality is strong which is guaranteed to force you to you miss your bus stop/train stop/own wedding. The game is played in landscape with no fancy motion or multi touch controls so perfect for those times you want to look like you are not playing games but actually reviewing some very important emails.

It’s hard to find a game that doesn’t feel like you have played it before on the Android market place as the android system is yet to have its renaissance unlike Apple’s app store where franchies and innovation seem to be part and parcel with owning the platform. The difference between the iPhone and App store is that the android market is not flooded with games so it gives niche gamer developers a chance to get their games noticed as the Android market place is lacking in original games.

However this does lead to a pattern emerging the fact of clones breaking out,such as Bejewelled and Tetris, that look and feel great but for anything more interesting or innovative feel underworked and ill thought out.

Archipelago does well at proving my point. The textures are not shiny and the animations are not as smooth and worse of all there is no sound which for a paid for app is disappointing. The user interface is average and I feel I have seen the art work before. Archipelago maps the physical buttons oddly; Archipelago does not use the menu button to bring up a menu it… well does nothing. To bring up the menu you hit back, counter intuitive as this could be used as an undo button for dire decisions/situations. There are no instructions only a, well worded, tutorial and one of my biggest problems grievances is that it has no save button! Although the game auto saves, I need to save to put my mind at rest and save, with a real button, I have already been caught out and have to start again! These are all small problems however it is the fact that I have seen this genre too many times recently that brings my overall view of it down.

Its very easy to criticise a game like this as it feels like a project two steps from being ready for release, perhaps if they put BETA in a shiny label on the corner I wouldn’t mind as much. Over all an just addictive enough to look over its flaws.

Archipelago, Android, $2.99

If you’re like me, then right now your suffering from a severe case of World Cup fever. The anticipation of unbelievable highs like ‘that’ Owen goal against Argentina are balanced in more or less equal proportions with a sickening terror that we are only 1 second away from another Maradona or Seaman moment, where all hopes are ripped away in a heart beat. You watch every game, whether its England labouring to another ill deserved and scrappy win or Brazil seemingly able bamboozle their fellow professionals with ridiculous ease.

But what do you do in between games? Or on those annoying days during the latter stages (that’s where you go beyond the group stages and play one off knock out games, for our Scottish readers. I would address our Welsh one’s too but I’m assuming they are still stuck on the first sentence and are desperately searching the words ‘World’ and ‘Cup’) (ouch :ed) where we get a day off!
Obsessive tinkering with my dream team aside I like to take control of the players I have just been watching, and prove that my armchair punditry is formed from deep knowledge of all things football and the kind of keen tactical footballing brain that would get England playing the way they should.

EA’s 2010 FIFA World Cup South Africa would seem to be the perfect outlet, or is it a wolf in sheep’s clothing? Are you just throwing another £35 – £40 to a corporation for a game that, as a football fan, you more than likely already have in FIFA 10? You already have the national teams with the exception of the crap ones like New Zealand and North Korea but who wants them anyway, and you can change the squads to your hearts content. Why EA? Why should we the football fans of the world fork out more hard earned money on your latest incarnation of a game we already own?

Atmosphere…one word, but a word that says so much more. Its the reason I get that sinking feeling when England go to penalties or when I see Heskey’s name on the team sheet. Its why I woke up every morning in 2002 to watch games from Japan and South Korea that I would normally never watch. Its the reason I get that empty feeling the day after the final when I know that, that is it, no more World Cup for 4 years. There is no other sporting event like it and it is this atmosphere and emotion that EA have succeeded in cramming into their World Cup tie-in.

From the moment you turn on 2010 FWCSA, you’re instantly immersed, even the menu screen with its world Cup branding somehow gets the hairs on your neck standing up and fills your heart with the spirit of ‘66. Cynics amongst us (I include myself as one of them) would point out that this dressing is just to take our attention away from the fact that they have just sold us the same game as they did back in September, and on the surface they would be right. With the exception of some great national anthem sequences and the addition of excellent cut away scenes of your national manager, be it Fabio Capello or Dunga on the sidelines, the in game play is very much the same.

The passing seems to have been given a tweak and there seems to be smoother player control but all in all this is the same game. Then you begin to settle, and get on with the serious job of Qualifying England for the World Cup. Win your home games and do your best to recreate that stuffing we gave the Croats on their own patch and suddenly you begin to notice the real difference. It starts with that away day in Zagreb, the buzz of the crowd, the feint sound of the England band puts your mind back to how it felt to watch Walcott put away that hat-trick.

Four hours later your playing the opening game of the World Cup…against the Yanks…now the fans are in full voice as only England fans can be, the band playing the theme from “the Great Escape’. The buzz that you got wherever you were when England walked out against America begins to come back, you don’t just wanna score goals and progress, you want to right the mistakes that were made in that game, bring on Joe Cole instead of Wright-Phillips, play Gerrard behind Rooney instead of ‘donkey’, and somewhere in middle of all this you realise that the atmosphere that gives you World Cup Fever in the first place, that makes you watch the New Zealand’s and the North Korea’s with almost as much passion as you would England, is no longer missing in between games or on the days off, its somehow been harnessed in a game, that, to anyone who doesn’t understand the greatest show on earth, is just a carbon copy of a game you already own.

Maybe we are being ripped off, on the surface the amount of changes don’t really justify the price tag, but then, we all know FIFA 11 is around the corner and deep down we all know we’ll be buying that too.
It could be worse, we could be playing Pro Evo.

Farming, a method that many city folk will never get the chance to participate in unless they are completely yuppy and decide to set up a farm in their city like the London farm. What is the attraction though for recent simulations that allow us to tend crops, plough fields and make sure that all of our workers are cared for and pass immigration laws.

Farmville pioneered this genre on Facebook and it’s much anticipated move to the iPhone is coming soon, however until that time comes, NGMOCO have created a very strong representation of the genre and have mixed added sim elements to the equation.

We Rule allows the user to take control of their own kingdom, which starts off as a small domain with only a few farmers and farming areas. It requires you to grow crops depending on how many coins you have in your ye olde money bag, which then, depending on the crops, give you more money and experience.

As you level up more items become available for which you can buy to expand your farm. It is the hook of the leveling up system that will keep you playing We Rule especially as the game allows you to level up particularly fast during the opening exchanges between farm and finger. It is then that the game is hooked in your subconscious so you will continue to play even though it takes longer to level up. It is like smoking, but worse for your health. yes I meant worse.

I say this as We Rule can completely destroy your social life if you let it; Conversations are no longer exciting unless you are checking the time left on your carrots; Trips to work are not complete unless you collect your taxes. This is not a criticism of the game, as like smoking, We Rule caters for your addiction by always leaving you wanting more. NGMOCO completely nailed the time based gameplay to keep you playing and the push notifications always make sure that you are reminded that the game is still there, even when you are not playing.

The push notifications remind you that your next little fix is not far away. The game does slow down though as the distance between leveling up gets greater and greater. This process can be sped up through the use of mojo which speeds up the growing time of your crops or the building time of your buildings. Using these comes at a cost as you only have a set amount per level up, unless you want to use real money and buy some through an in-app purchase.

The cartoony graphics compliment the light natured feel of the game. There is not mode in which you can attack other civilizations, it is just a game where you rule in coherence with other rules around you. The other rulers being you friends that you can add to your map through the excellent PLUS+ system or through facebook/twitter. By expanding your friends list, you get added XP, which helps you level up. Overall, We Rule encourages you to share the game to get more coins, an example to all on how to make a game that organically markets itself.

Controlling the game is a breeze as simple swipes and pinches allow you to move around the game world, viewing stats on each item through simple touches of the screen. Obviously, pinching the screen allows you to zoom in on your world just incase you need to see your crops close up.

My one and only qualm with the game is the constant need that it has to be connected to the web. This has frustrated me on numerous occasions as the game has stopped me from doing the basic tasks as there is no longer a connection. Why NGMOCO feel this is necessary is beyond me, but there has to be a good reason.

Overall, this an addictive time sim and one I would recommend to anyone who wants a new time sink this summer to either keep them away from the football or occupy themselves when there are no games on. Oh and I almost forgot, it’s free to download.

Abundante, Arrrrrriba Arrrriba. Que Tal, Me gustaria ir al discoteca.

When creating a puzzle game, you have to make sure that the idea is sound and that you implement and tune a control system that will work even when the user is panicking. Take tetris for example. The simplicity of its control system makes it easier to learn whilst in the beginning stages but like all good puzzle games, it will take a while to master. This is the same for Abundante. You will grasp the control system within minutes and then will have you speed and strategy tested as the levels progress and obviously get faster and faster.

In Abundante, the aim is to take blocks from above of selected colour and then link them to block of the similar colour, hence creating a chain. When there is a chain then boom, the blocks disappear and other blocks around it fall into place, which causes a combo hence forth increasing your point score ergo making your experience of the game better. If only life was that easy.

The game increases with difficulty through it’s levels by slowly speeding up the amount of the time that the blocks move down from the top of the screen and by adding various different blocks that are detrimental to your health. There are moss blocks that spread the moss to adjacent blocks, which can’ t be destroyed directly but will fall to its doom on destruction of those around it. Concrete blocks that can’t be grabbed by you and also have to be destroyed indirectly.

By expanding the game mode, the player has to re address their strategy to complete the levels and levels there are. On count there are 100+ levels so the game length warrants the price of the game.

Some blocks give up more gems, which is the prime purpose of the game. On the left side of the screen is a progress bar that you have to fill up by collecting jewels that fall on destruction of the block. You can earn acquire more jewels by creating shapes with the blocks that you have, which give you bonus jewels at the end to increase your score. It’s an idea that works very well but sometimes moving the cart gets forgotten by the player. To compensate for this the jewels nearly always fall automatically into the cart, but it does seem like moving the cart was a second thought.

However,

The control system works naturally as you touch the block you want, if its linked to any equal colours, these come join the party on et cart as well. You then touch the column where you want to place these blocks. Simples. The touch based controls could have had you smacking your head against a brick wall constantly but luckily the touch events have been refined to a 99% success rate for selecting the correct column where to place your blocks. The 1% failure rate is when you are moving to fast to carefully place your blocks, a fault of our own, not of the game.

What needs to be addressed though is that the developers really missed a trick by not including social gaming features such as Open Feint as this would have really benefitted Abundante. It’s ‘tell a friend’ feature is not enough to expose a game as I for one can say I have never used that feature. The facebook feature although currently over used can not be underestimated for how it can help get downloads of game.

If you like puzzle games and fancy a game to pass the time, then for$2.99, Abundante is for you.

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Girls, dressed in Scantily clad clothes and with pillows. What else do you need to make a more manly game. Well a chance in hell might be nice.

Going to jump right in here. A learning curve in games is something that is very unappreciated these days as sometimes games start off rock hard and just expect you to ‘like it or lump it’ however these are games that you have paid £45 and you are willing to give it a go. The iPhone market however is completely different as users expect a quick fix and if they do not get it straight away, then the app is cast into the metaphorical bin, or the trash can. This is the case for Pillowfight Wars.

The main concerns with the game is how it is controlled, and this comes in a one two combo.

Left hook POW

Within moments of turning it on I was frustrated by the unresponsiveness of the actions from pressing the buttons and how every hit i tried to land on my opponent she blocked. Even if I waited for 10 seconds before attacking, she seemed to know it was coming. The frustration as every attack of hers seemed to to hit as i took my finger of block to attack was equally frustrating. If this game was undercooked steak you would have fed it to the dogs already.

Right hook KAWPOW

The other not being the fault of the developers at all but down to a recent fad. I for one do not like on screen joysticks and it seems to have become common place on the iPhone, when done correctly they are brilliant (Street Fighter) but in this case where it does not seem complete it can lead to some uninspiring moments. Screen estate is tight in the iPhone but that does not mean the arrows have to be made for locksmiths and surgeons (they have steady hands you see).

Knockout but without the uppercut.

However, if you change the learning curve and possibly refine the controls a bit, Pillowfight Girls could be a great representative of the fighting genre. I say this as the rest of the game is very well put together. The graphics are polished and the overall premise is original, it is just let down by a few niggles. Even though the game is not as good as it could be, i think that it will sell well because of its premise. If over time the game gets refined, then those young red blooded males will have not only a voyeuristic game in their pocket but also a sturdy fighting game.