Review: Monster Dash

Platform: iPhone/iPod Touch
Genre: Action/Platformer
Publisher: Halfbrick Studios
Developer: Halfbrick Studios
Release Date: August 19, 2010

Ever wanted to go running through a world with no public transportation with a shotgun in hand? What if it was a portable experience on your phone (or iPod)?

Interested yet? I was.

Monster Dash is a very simple action game, with only two controls, jumping and shooting. By holding your device of choice (For me, it's my iPod Touch) horizontally, you get two touch sensitive spots in the bottom corners of the screen. The left corner is for jumping, while the right corner is for shooting. Dependent on how long you hold your finger down on these spots, your jump and shooting (to a degree) are effected. For example, the longer you hold down on the jump button, the higher your jump. The same can be said with the weapons, but more on that later.

Movement is not a concern, as you are automatically moving from left to right, side-scrolling through 4 different environments (That change every 1000m). The catch is that you have to jump over random obstacles, like spikes and gaps between buildings. The speed increases as you are taken to new areas, so after 4000km, it starts getting tougher. In my experience, the speed before then is no problem.

Another small catch is the enemies (Which would be too easy if there weren't any). Each environment has it's own enemy, to fit with the theme. You can jump on top of enemies and bounce off their heads in a Mario kind of style, or you can blow through them with your weapon of choice. Or combine them both for even more fun.

Which leads me to the weapons. You always carry a shotgun, which has a short range, but works pretty decently for just about any situation. There are 5 weapons besides the shotgun, however they have a limited set of bullets and have to be picked up along the way (Originally 4, but between starting this review and posting it, Halfbrick added a 5th weapon). They are all very fun to use, and I won't spoil any of them if you want it to be a surprise, but I am sure you can find a video if you really wanna see.

The game itself had a lot of care put into it, with the sounds and music being just as important as the visuals. Down to the small things, like seeing the shell casing fly from your gun after every shotgun round, to hearing a very catchy little tune being used for the game, remixed for each environment you are in. As a plus, you can even play your own music in the background and turn off the in-game music if you want, since it can get old if you play this too much.

I can't say this game doesn't have it's flaws, however. It seems like the weapon boxes and hearts you collect (You get three hearts, meaning you take three hits to die) are sometimes just placed in such a way that it's almost impossible to get, especially at the higher speeds, where a simple misclick of the jump button could be your doom. Occasionally, the enemies will appear from above or come out of the ground, and again, at those higher speeds, you can't avoid them without godly reflexes, which might be a turn-off for some of you. It's a trade-off for it becoming so fast-paced, but it should be a little more manageable.

This game is a worthwhile pick-up for all gamers with an iDevice, since it's so cheap and is pretty fun to just play every now and then. With the support of OpenFeint, achievements and leader boards even give you more to shoot for while playing, and most you will stumble across while just playing for fun anyways. Even with the flaws, this is still a very great game with a lot of fun moments, even in dying.

Score: 8.5/10.