Snood iPhone review
by Dave Pitchforth
Publisher/Developer: Electronic Arts
Genre: Puzzle
Price: $3.99
Verdict: Entertaining puzzle game that could easily become very addictive
Pros: Plenty of different game modes to give much needed variety
Cons: Can get frustrating if you’re not pixel-perfectly accurate
Snood is one of those games that have been around for a really long time, but one that so many gamers may not have heard of. Originally released back in 1996 for the PC, Snood is a variant of a game many people will have already played – Puzzle Bobble, also known as Bust-a-Move. Now released on the iPhone, Snood brings a variety of game modes, both single and multiplayer, and comes out as an entertaining, if slightly frustrating game.
For those out there who have never played a game of this type before, the premise of it is quite simple. Each level has a number of Snoods together at the top of each stage, and your job is to fire randomly coloured Snoods out of your cannon, aiming to connect 3 or more of the same colour together. If you do that, the Snoods will drop off the stage, with your ultimate aim being to clear the stage completely of Snoods. Like a lot of games, this sounds very easy and perhaps a little boring, but in practise it can become very challenging as some of the shots you have to make require near pixel-perfect accuracy. One slightly misplaced shot can easily ruin a level, requiring shots to be bounced off walls as you go hunting for a way to fix your error.
One good thing about Snood is that in virtually every game mode (bar Time Attack), there is no time limit for each shot. You can judge your shots for as long as you want, or weigh up possible options and strategies. You can only see the colour of your current Snood and the one you will fire next, so there is some luck involved if you try to work something based on a certain colour Snood that may not appear as quickly as you’d like. To make sure things aren’t too easy however is the danger meter at the very bottom of the stage. This meter fills up with every shot you take, and empty as you remove Snoods from the stage. Should the meter fill up to the top, the Snoods will descend one level. Should they ever pass the bottom of the stage your game will be over.
To make sure you have plenty of ways to play the game, EA have given you several options. For the solo players out there, you can play in Story Mode, Classic Mode, Time Attack, or Puzzle Mode. Each of these modes can be played in one of the 5 different difficulty settings, ranging from Child to Evil. To go with these single player modes, you also have 2 different multiplayer modes available to you – Live play, and Challenge play. Live play is just as the name sounds, with you and a friend playing the same level at the same time, trying to beat the other. Challenge mode has you posting scores for your friends to try and beat whenever they want. The downside to these multiplayer modes is that the both use Facebook Connect, which means you need to have a Facebook account to use them. It’s a shame that the game effectively forces you to have a Facebook account to play with friends, as not everyone uses it and if you want to challenge people you’ll have no idea which people on your friends list are actually capable of playing the game and returning your challenges.
Graphically Snood is a very pretty game. It’s not a graphical powerhouse by any means, but it’s very colourful and has a very pleasing look about it. It’s all put together in a very nice package, from the menus and help to the actual game itself. The only thing that bothers me is that the game is played in portrait mode, yet the menus and instructions are in landscape mode. It’s a strange choice given how the game is played, but it’s a minor niggle and one which has no bearing on how the game actually plays. The in game music is pretty decent as well and you’ll have no problems listening to it for long game sessions, though the game does offer full iPod integration so you can listen to your own music as you play, always a welcome feature for me.
Snood is one of the lovely games that you start playing with the intention of just having a 5 minute blast, only to still be playing 30 minutes later wondering where the time has gone. The amount of accuracy needed for some shots can lead to some frustrating times when playing, but the lack of a time limit on nearly all game modes means that these mistakes will reduce the more you playas you learn to take your time and line up your shots just right. With plenty of game modes and 5 levels of difficulty, Snood offers plenty of ways to play and they’re all enjoyable. If you’re a fan of puzzle games then Snood comes highly recommended.
