I’ve basically been a fan of Twin-Stick Shooters — and how they allow you to single handedly tackle massive armies — ever since I first played Smash TV, and that was despite the fact I first experienced the somewhat mediocre NES version. I’m also a fan of neon-infused minimalistic retro-based visual presentations, as was pretty much demonstrated with my recent review of the Battlezone inspired Panzerkampf 3 (our review). However — although Peanut Butter and Chocolate are the Holy Grail of mixed items — not all tastes necessarily go nicely together, as was sadly the case with Devastator (out now, $1.99).
For those of you not already aware, the basic premise for a Twin-Stick Shooter is that, rather than dealing with a complex array of buttons, your primary inputs will be two joysticks. One of these — which is usually located on the left — will be used to freely move your character about in all possible directions, while the other enables you to simultaneously fire in any direction at will (furthermore independent of you movement). As I previously stated, the great thing about this set up is that it gives you the tools necessary to adequately deal with rampaging hordes simultaneously approaching from all sides (often leading to some very exciting game play).
Devastator has definitely got the basic idea of a Twin-Stick Shooter down pat, with there being two virtual analog joysticks — one in each corner — for the player’s primary control methods. With this you’ll be able to fly your blue-shape around a nondescript blue-stage, while trying to either avoid or destroy the relentless swarm of orange-things harassing you from all sides (and some of you probably just deduced one of my complaints). During all of this you’ll try to grab yet other blue-shape-things, as they are the only things that can fuel your powerful super-weapon (more special weapon types will become available as you unlock achievements, but you’ll only be able to select one each run).
A stage ends when you successfully kill all of actually-killable orange-shapes, but you’ll have to be fast as new orange-shapes will be rapidly added non-stop in order to ensure you never lollygag about. Some of these enemies added will be special impervious variants, whom may only be optionally-harmed via your super weapon (thankfully — although definitely annoying — these enemies don’t actually need to be stopped). Once a stage is finished you’ll find yourself in another nondescript blue-stage, and then the process begins itself anew — all over again from the top — until you either die and/or quit.
Which brings me to the two different game modes initially available when you first boot-up Devastator: easy (which features unlimited lives), and hardcore (where you begin with three lives, but can earn more as you gain points). Not matter which of these two modes you play in — however — the stage will completely reset each time you die, meaning victory only happens when you clear out all of the enemies with just a single life. While this feature certainly won’t do you any favors during the life-limited Hardcore Mode, it certainly helps to ensure that Devastator’s Easy Mode isn’t simply a bonafide cakewalk.
Sadly, although certain stages have different gimmicks — such as pads that instantaneously teleport you across the stage — Devastator’s charm doesn’t exactly hold up for all that long once you begin playing. Although I can’t quite immediately put a finger on why, I would wager the fact it’s really hard to tell stuff apart in this game isn’t doing my attempt to enjoy Devastator any favors whatsoever. Honestly — especially when played with a iPod Touch — Devastator is a game where everything is super hard to tell apart, particularly when the developer chose to basically only ever use just two colors.
When you’re blue, the stage is blue, two different kinds of obstacles are blue (some that can be shot through, and some that can’t), your power-ups are blue, your buttons are blue, your HUD is blue, and other things are too, it quickly becomes hard to tell stuff apart. This is probably going to sound bad on my part, but I actually had a lot of trouble determining where Devastator’s two joysticks — which even had on screen graphics — were physically located at first. Apparently the developer had decided that his blue buttons — already placed on top of mostly blue stages — should be both dimmed, as well as made semi transparent, until after you’ve physically placed your fingers on top of them.
However — trouble with finding them aside — Devastator’s virtual twin-sticks do work correctly once you figure out where your fingers actually need to be, it just shouldn’t have been a challenge to find the barely visible buttons in the first place. At least Devastatior’s twin-sticks exist in a semi-logical place, whereas it was many runs in before I discovered the location of the game’s equally nigh on undetectable pause button. While you can eventually escape Hardcore Mode simply by dying enough times that the game ends, the infinite life Easy Mode won’t ever end until you successfully hit this button hidden near the screen’s upper-right (either that, or you force close the app itself).
Finally — when dealing with tons of enemies at once — you really don’t have much time to appreciate the slight differences between two very similar orange-shapes, all so that you can successfully determine which one is the invulnerable unit. Again, this is another one of Devastator’s clarity issues that may well potentially be less of a problem when played upon a far larger device (but I can’t personally guarantee that’s truly the case either). What I definitely can say for sure — though — is that you most certainly don’t want to be playing in an area with lots of light reflecting off your iDevice screen, as that would quickly render Devastator’s low-contrast blue-on-blue stages into an unnavigatable mess.
However — before one reads too much into my ranting — I’m actually not trying to convey the idea that Devastator is a deplorably unplayable mess, as it’s actually decently passable. Yet between having generic Twin-Stick Shooter action — and low-contrast graphics that unfortunately blend together — all at the same time, it would be lying to claim that you couldn’t easily find a better app. For instance, take a look at Death Gear (our review); for that’s an enjoyably action-packed game — complete with nice 3D graphics — that’s being offered for free, all while having nary a single mood-spoiling IAP.
Verdict
Although Devastator clearly seeks to be a retro-stylized neon-infused minimally-presented old-school Twin-Stick Shooter, something didn’t exactly come together correctly along the way. The end result is a game with passable — but not great — action, that is sadly plagued with a variety of visibility issues due to the game’s low-contrast art scheme (a problem that is possibly confounded on smaller iDevices). Although the game itself isn’t necessarily bad — per se — the looming problem is that there’s just much better alternatives available, such as the wholly-free Death Gear released earlier this year (complete with nice 3D graphics, and no IAPs what-so-ever).