Survival of the Fattest
Some have it that a humongous asteroid wiped the dinosaurs off the face of the earth, others reckon a sudden and deadly cold snap was to blame. App Store newcomers, Nemoid Studio have another theory – perhaps it was simply their monstrous appetites and mega-fast metabolisms that brought about extinction.
With that in mind, Nemoid’s new endless run ‘n’ jump game, Dino Rush, sees you trying your damnedest to save a cute baby dinosaur by munching as much fruit as possible as you’re propelled through four prehistoric platformer-y levels.
Guiding Dundy, the titular dino, through these side-scrolling, Mario Land-esque environments is pretty simple. He trots along automatically, so all you’ve really got to worry about is jumping, which is achieved by tapping anywhere on the screen. Naturally, navigating fast-paced levels is made more treacherous by a number of obstacles, including cacti, spiky stegosauruses, swooping pterodactyls, red-hot lava pits and more.
As you play, you must also keep a close eye on Dundy’s health bar, because if he isn’t constantly chowing down on fruit, it depletes at an alarming rate, and when empty he’ll keel over and kick the bucket in a matter of seconds. Thankfully then there are a range of power-ups strewn around levels, which when gobbled by Dundy, give him some ker-razy and visually stunning special powers. For example, a super hero oufit that allows him to fly, or a fiery chilli pepper that gives the little dinosaur a rather explosive case of indigestion.
All in all, I did quite enjoy Dino Rush – and anyone whose sampled the simple delights of the likes of Canabalt can attest to the sheer addictiveness of these endless running games – however, given that the game’s fairly easy, it won’t take the average player very long to rush through all four levels.
Unlocking an extra playable character (a Dodo) does give an incentive to keep playing, while, of course, there are the standard Game Center achievements and leaderboards to have a crack at, but ultimately there’s no getting around the fact this game is pretty light on content. Let’s hope updates build on this initial release’s potential by throwing a few new environments, game modes and power-ups into the mix, otherwise Dundy’s future doesn’t look all that bright.
iFanzine Verdict: Charming presentation, luscious visuals and a couple of super-cute playable characters fail to gloss over the fact that Dino Rush is a pretty bare bones release. As it stands, the game’s fun but it really could do with a few more levels and modes to bulk out its brief running time and increase little Dundy’s life span.
[xrr rating=3/5]