iPhone/iPod Touch Review – DoodleJump

05. Feb, 2010 0 Comments | |

For anyone who owns this game, or anyone who has ever been on it. They will most probably agree with me that it is the most addicting game ever. I would go as far as to say that one of the main reasons I got my iPod Touch was to get this app. (Okay, I exaggerate a little, but you get the idea..)

Buy DoodleJump here:

What is it?

DoodleJump is a 59p/99c app from the Apple Appstore, for iPhones and iPod Touches. It involves tilting the iPod to direct a “Doodler” onto blocks. The aim is to get as high as possible. Most players get pathetic scores around 20,000. Pros like myself and my friends get 90,000+ and sad gamers get 2,000,000. (See here)

Although it sounds rather futile, it gets incredibly addictive. Seeing as I’ve clocked up more than 10 hours on this game, I can tell you from personal experience. It is hard to put it down.

About the game:

Throughout the game you get different obstacles in your way.

Monsters – End the game if you jump into them, takes one shot to kill
Black holes – Must be avoided, ends game if fallen into
UFOs – Must be shot once, ends game if fallen into
Bosses – Killed by shooting more than once, or by jumping on them

You can kill monsters with one shot (by tapping the screen) this fires a bullet and kills the monster. UFOs take one shot, bosses take more. And Black holes have to be avoided!

As well as the crazily fast moving platforms (in blue, and at higher scores), the brown platforms which crumble (can’t say I’ve ever been fooled into thinking it was green though..) and just being under pressure into landing on a platform after each jump.

Platforms:

Green – standard unmoving platform
Brown – Crack when landed on
Grey – Moving platform (Up and Down)
Grey – Can be moved by dragging on touch screen
White – Disappear after one jump
Blue – Moving platform (get faster higher up)
Yellow – Turn too red after a short while, then blow up and disappear.

The game isn’t easy, and it certainly brings on a sweat when you start progressing to higher scores. It gets increasingly annoying when you have spent the past 7minutes getting to 80,000 and then to miss a platform whilst daydreaming. Easily done, my mind is always drifting off to better places…

Along the way you can get Power Ups…

Spring – 352 points
Trampoline – 520 points
Helicopter Hat – 1736 points
Spring Shoes – 2068 points
Rocket – 3306 points
Shield – Protects you from monsters for a short while

You can pause the game only 3 times (to make it fair). They certainly come in handy when you need to wipe down your iPod after excessive sweating. I wouldn’t be surprised if my iPod died from water damage.

Fun Stuff:

Linking with Facebook and Twitter

Doesn’t get much easier to brag to your friends with your newest high score..

Worldwide + Friend Leaderboards

See worldwide scores. And understand how sad many people are! Friends scores are based on FaceBook friends, so you need to link your account.

Stats

Cool stats with “Total Games Played”, “Highest score” “Total Play Time” and more…

Easter eggs:

Save your Name as:

“Ooga”

Get to play as the character from “Pocket God”

“Snow”

Basically a snow theme with different monsters!

“Creeps”

Just some different monsters

“Boo”

Looks good, but isn’t particularly useful as you can barely see anything!

Ratings

Price:

59p/99c, not bad for an app. Would have been nice to have seen it going for free, but 59p/99c isn’t exactly a bank buster. Considering I’ve had more playing time on this than I have for Call of Duty MW2, I consider it a good buy..

- 7/10

Graphics

Simple, but stylish in a pleasant fashion. (I’m trying here!)

- 8/10

Controls

- “Smooth like a babies bottom” as Chris would say. They don’t get much simpler than this.

Tap the screen to shoot enemies, drag moving platforms using touch screen. Tilt to direct doodler.

9.5/10

Lifespan

Although it seems like a game which gets boring after a while, it being repetitive in all. But I do believe it has one of the longest lifespan of the apps I have on my iPod. Mainly because of how fun and addictive the game is. It’s also nice to see updates frequently, with different scenarios: