Publisher/Developer: Ghostlight LTD
Genre: Sports
Price: $5.99
Verdict: An excellent sports game with plenty to keep you busy
Pros: Excellent presentation and several ways to play
Cons: Missing some fun events, and online leaderboards would have been nice

I’ve been a fan of athletics games for as long as I can remember. Back on my old Commodore 64, I spent many an hour playing Daley Thompson’s Decathlon, aiming to break all my high scores, and inadvertently breaking several joysticks as well. As time went on and we moved away from joysticks to controllers, joystick waggling was replaced by button mashing. Now as we move into mobile gaming, that’s not really an option anymore, lest we break our expensive toys. With a solution comes Ghostlight and their International Athletics game for the iPhone/iPod Touch. Using a system similar to the joystick waggling of old, the game allows armchair gamers the chance to break the world records and win the gold medals, and what an enjoyable experience it turns out to be.

International Athletics gives gamers 11 different track and field events to play and a few different ways to play them. All of the standard events are there, such as the 100m sprint, 110m hurdles, the long jump, pole vault, javelin, and more. It’s a shame there aren’t additional event types here, such as shooting or archery (which could have used the iPhone’s accelerometer for aiming), but what is here is a nice mixture of events that should please everyone.

The controls for each event are handled very nicely using the touch sensitive screen. As inferred from the opening paragraph, rather than waggling a joystick, you’ll often find yourself swiping your finger backwards and forwards across the screen as quickly as possible to build up speed, then tapping the screen to jump or launch your throw. Most events use the same system to build up speed, though others may have you drawing a circle to build up speed instead of swiping your finger. Before each event you’re given instructions on the controls you need to use, and while most are pretty simple, some will still require you to play the event a few times before you get really comfortable with what you’re doing.

Thankfully this is made easier by the fact that you can play any event on its own in Quick Event mode. In here you can choose to just play an event once, or replay it as many times as you need to become proficient in an event. I personally used it as more of a training tool than a quick play mode, as some events do take more practice than others.

Alongside the Quick Event mode, there is also a Decathlon mode, which comprises of 10 events, and a Tournament mode, where you have to beat one tournament before unlocking the next one. Both modes are good fun and none take too long, even the Decathlon which has 10 of the 11 events.

There are also 3 difficulties to choose from, with Rookie offering players a nice gentle route into the game, while Advanced will test even the most experienced gamers. If you’re not comfortable with the controls in International Athletics, don’t even think about trying Advanced mode, unless you’re something of a masochist and enjoy being humiliated!

From a presentational and graphical point of view, International Athletics is excellently put together. Cameras pan from different angles, there are replays at the end of events, medal ceremonies, and your character shows emotion for either good or bad performances. The graphics are pretty good and the athletes all animate nicely for all the events. You can go into the Award Cabinet and see all the trophies and medals you’ve won in your career. It’s a well put together packages that has pretty much everything you need. An online leaderboard is sorely missing however, as it would be nice to see where your performances rank amongst the best in the world. The game does keep track of your own personal bests however, so you always know whether you’re improving or not as you come closer to your own times and distances.

Sonically however, the game is a little bit of a let down. There is no menu music and while you do hear the roar of the crowd in the events, they seem a little under awed by it all, cheering at the wrong time and not seemingly overly impressed by your Herculean efforts. Some nice generic rock music would have gone a long way, especially if it played in the background between events, when everything goes a little too quiet for my liking.

As an overall package, International Athletes is one of the most enjoyable games I’ve played yet on my iPod. At $5.99 it’s a little more expensive than other games, but if you’re after an athletics game, you’ll find it hard to go wrong here. Putting it in athletics terms, this game is the equivalent of Usain Bolt, blowing past the competition and proving itself to be a huge star.