iPhone Reviews 2.0

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Time Crisis Strike is a first person shooter by Namco Networks. $5.99

Time Crisis Strike was one of the first FPS games to come onto the App Store. Personally I'm not a big fan of this genre, preferring racing and sport games, but I don't mind playing one every now and then. After playing this for the first time on easy I noticed one thing, it is REALLY difficult! This game generally has a theme of three for everything. There are three game modes, three stages in the main mode, three difficulty levels and three lives. The difficulty levels are different to most games, where you would usually expect the enemies to be weaker or slower. Instead of that, it determines how many hearts or hits you can take before you lose a life. On hard you only have three hearts, on medium you have four hearts and on easy you have five. The game is quite short, but the difficult gameplay and addictiveness of this game means that you will be playing it repeatedly.

This game has the best graphics I have seen by Namco in the five games I have played by them. The game is extremely detailed and has sharp, crisp characters and backgrounds. The graphics could easily look great on slightly older consoles or in arcades, where the game I assume originated from. There are different types of people shooting back at you, ranging from the normal guys to ones with more health that wear different clothing. If this game was as short as it was and the graphics weren't up to scratch, I wouldn't give it a second look. The controls are very simple yet effective. To shoot you just tap on the screen where you want to shoot. I found this a very good option for this game, as quick reflexes are needed instead of trying to fiddle around with where your gun is pointed. To reload and hide from your attackers you tilt the device either forward or backward, depending on your setting. I personally tilt it backward as I can still see and prepare for my next attack. You move from hiding place to hiding place automatically as all enemies are killed in that section.

One big advantage with ported games is that they really don't have to redo the graphics and sound much. Being from an arcade environment, Time Crisis Strike is loaded to the brim with awesome sound effects. There is alot going on in the game, with many sounds of guns being fired from all directions. A few voices are heard during the game, generally a guy telling you to reload. Time Crisis Strike is a joy to play with the sound on, and I have yet to get sick of it.

The game has three different game modes. They are Arcade, One Stage Trial and Crisis Mission. Arcade leads you through the entire game, trying to survive 3 stages that vary in difficulty. The first stage is quite easy and doesn't involve many multiple hits to kill enemies. There is one kind of 'boss' on this level but it is very easy to defeat. The second stage has no 'boss' as such but I found harder than the first stage. The final stage revolves around defeating an extra strong guy at each location in the stage. This is super hard and I have yet to finish it on easy after many attempts. One Stage Trial is the same as Arcade but instead of playing the whole game, you just choose a stage to play. The stages you can play depend on if you have completed them in Arcade, so I can only attempt the first two stages. Crisis Mission is totally different to the other modes. It has all these different missions that you can complete, I believe there are 5 in total. They require things like to kill x amount of people in so many seconds or shoot only the yellow enemies. I have tried it a few times and since they are locked until you complete the one before it. They are as difficult as the rest of the game, and I have only completed the first two. Everything has their own high score board with preloaded high scores. They are set very high and I have only managed to get one of my own score onto these once. Again it sets you another challenge

Time Crisis Strike is a very addictive game. Unlike other games that are easy to complete, Time Crisis Strike provides a great challenge. The game is super smooth and has never crashed yet. This is a great game for those who enjoy needing to play it multiple times before they master it. The gameplay is very fun and the ways the controls have been implemented are very well done. I love the graphics and sound and I believe it is more fun on the iDevice than it would be on a big screen at the arcade. Amazing game, I recommend that you check it out if you enjoy these types of games. Just don't expect it to be an easy experience.

Gameplay- 9/10
Graphics- 9/10
Sound- 9.5/10
Overall- 9/10

I would recommend this game if you enjoyed- Metal Gear Solid Touch

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