Game Review: Sky Jam - IOS

Genre: Flying Survival

Age Rating: 3+

Price: FREE ( In App Purchases Apply )

Platform: IOS ( IPhone and Ipad )

Design:

Sky Jam is a survival flying app made by NXComponents GmbH (we'll call them NX for short). Its basically the same as that helicopter game that everybody used to play at school where you change the altitude by pressing the screen to avoid air traffic while keeping your fuel at a reasonable level by collecting it as you fly, along with shields and coins to buy power-ups from 'The Store'. The only problem being that NX expects alot from their players by asking them to have 5000 coins for the cheapest power-up, not the best game plan in my opinion a modest 500 coins would have been adequate for the cheapest boost and then escalate it from there. Air traffic is constantly flying at you so you have to have a quick finger (or thumb) for this game with planes invisible behind clouds as well as the ranking system which goes up or down depending on how you fly makes this game rather addictive.

Gameplay:

Okay so the game is simple enough to get a grip on, you change your altitude to avoid air traffic and collect boosts and fuel to keep your flight going, it's a concept which has been done before but it does lend itself nicely to the genre without looking like it is trying too hard to fit in. After a good solid minutes of blowing myself up multiple times by either running in to other planes, crashing into the floor, crashing into the ceiling (yes that's right there is a ceiling) or being grabbed by Godzilla and thrown at Japan at great speed ( okay that doesn't happen but you see where I'm going with this). The gameplay is promising but what I would really like to see is a leveling system where the difficulty gets progressively harder as you get further through, i appreciate that NX has tried to be different and break the genre but I feel that a leveling system would be beneficial for the player I would also like to see the fuel consumption to be gotten rid of, dodging planes is hard enough without having to try and grab a fuel tank right in front of an oncoming plane. Overall a decent gameplay but I feel it would be more enjoyable with the suggestions I have made :)

Presentation:

NX has got a nice little setup going with his graphics and sound although there is a slight problem with the clouds where you can see a black line under one in every five or six that comes along it's not a great problem but it's just something that I have noticed as I have played through. Sounds do genuinely sound like planes and general air transport as well as when you crash there is a generic explosion sound. Overall the presentation is okay, IPad users will have to view it in IPhone mode because the app hasn't been developed exclusively for IPad which is something that NX can move towards in the future :)

Summary:

Overall a pleasant game which is nice to pick up from time to time but not one you can play for hours on end due to it frustrating you after a short while. I will just stress that this review is not to knock NX at all I am merely stating what I have found as I have played the game. I feel that NX has made a very good start with his app career and can only get better as he moves forward.

Design: 6.8

Gameplay: 7.2

Presentation: 7.0

Overall: 7.0