With
more than 700 million downloads to its name, Angry Birds is as much a
part of pop culture as the Big Mac, The Beatles, or Justin Bieber. But
such popularity poses a problem: how to create a sequel that feels
fresh, yet still appeals to avian aficionados around the world. For
developer Rovio, the answer is gravity, or rather, the lack of it. Angry
Birds Space takes the fundamental physics-based flinging of the
original and turns it on its head--sometimes literally--by playing with
the gravity simulation that powers it. You're forced to think in new,
creative ways to solve puzzles, using the pull of planets to slingshot
your birds over greater distances and at previously impossible angles.
It's satisfying, yet completely familiar, and is heaps of pig-smashing
fun.
The
basics of Angry Birds remain unchanged in Space. You smash cute green
pigs that have neatly placed themselves atop, or in, precarious-looking
towers made of wood, steel, and ice. To do so, you're armed with birds,
which you fire out of a slingshot by dragging your finger over the
screen to pull it back in an effort to knock over the towers and crush
the pigs within. It sounds simple, but there's a surprising amount of
depth to the action. Different materials smash at different rates, so
while wood is easily smashed with a single bird, steel requires several
hits before you can smash through it.
Likewise,
there are different types of birds for you to use. There's the standard
red bird, which acts like a simple missile. The other feathered
projectiles include blue birds, which act like cluster bombs; black
birds, which explode with a tap; and green birds, whose hefty size makes
them ideal for smashing through larger structures. New to Space are
purple birds, which can be targeted like a homing missile with a tap,
and ice birds, which let you freeze parts of a structure, making it
easier to destroy. New birds are introduced gradually as you progress,
creating interesting challenges that tax the brain in new and exciting
ways. While your choice of birds is predetermined, the progression is
excellent, so you never feel overwhelmed by a sudden influx of
unfathomable avians.
The
twist in Space comes from an inventive use of gravity. Rather than
lounging on a simple surface, the pigs are spread across different
planetoids in space. Each planetoid has its own gravity field,
highlighted by a blue aura, which affects the movement of your birds.
This results in some incredibly inventive and often challenging puzzles.
You might have to use a planetoid's gravity field to curve the angle of
your bird to reach pigs nested on the far side, or make use of two
nearby fields to send a bird one way, only to have it join the other
field and slingshot around to hit pigs floating outside the atmosphere.
Other
puzzles are set entirely in space, where the lack of gravity means
objects float further and require less force to push them. One such
level sees you having to take out pigs by using small wooden blocks. You
use an exploding black bird to fling those blocks across the screen
like projectiles, hitting the defenseless pigs sealed within air
bubbles. There are a host of different ways in which gravity fields, or
the lack of them, are used, so you never feel like you're playing the
same puzzle twice. There is a certain amount of luck involved in the
puzzles, so sometimes you might fail a level, only to try the exact same
thing again and miraculously succeed. These moments are rare, though,
and the vast majority of the time you feel like you're in control of the
action.
Aside
from gravity fields, there are a few other additions to the Angry Birds
formula in space. Some levels house a hidden space egg, which takes you
to bonus levels that make tongue-in-cheek references to other games;
the Space Invaders-inspired level is particularly great. Other levels
feature boss characters, such as a pig-piloted robot. You can't destroy
the contraption directly and so must make use of nearby floating
asteroids, which you smash into the machine using your birds. The random
nature of the floating asteroids means these battles are based more on
luck than on skill, but thankfully they're not overly difficult to
complete and can be finished quickly.
The
final new addition is a special space eagle power-up, which is awarded
to you periodically. These let you summon the space eagle, who proceeds
to gobble up whole planetoids, letting you skip past difficult levels.
You're not awarded a star rating when you use the space eagle, though,
and are instead given a separate cosmic feather rating--meaning if you
want to impress the world with your collection of three-star ratings,
you have to do things the old-fashioned way. Trying to get three stars
on each level is very challenging, so there's good reason to go back
through and replay levels once you've made it through the initial
campaign. An extra set of hardcore levels can be purchased from within
the game for 69p (99 cents). And while they're fun, it's a shame they
aren't included with the initial purchase, particularly since there are
just two worlds of 30 levels to play through--fewer than in Space's
predecessors.
Angry
Birds Space is an incredibly addictive game. Even when you get
frustrated that you can't find a solution, you keep coming back for
more, and its bite-size levels make it ideal for playing on the go.
Developer Rovio has pulled off the difficult task of making a game that
feels new and exciting, yet familiar enough to easily pick up and play,
and the charming cartoon visuals and sounds are used to great effect.
Above all, Angry Birds Space is a lot of fun for a very small outlay (or
for free if you're playing on Android). There's no reason to feel
guilty about playing Angry Birds; it's a great game, and a phenomenon
that's one step closer to succeeding in its quest for world domination.
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