Anotherball Review By Sponge
Another Ball does a good job of explaining itself in the title: just another Araknoid clone. While there are no real problems with the game itself, it just doesn't do enough to make it special, however some may prefer the more original style gameplay over the rather frantic pace of Bust Em.
Graphics
Another Ball has a fantasy theme throughout a lot of the elements. The menus and UI show this, although the sprites in game don't match. Not a big complaint, however it was one way Another Ball could've been set apart from all the other clones out there. They're also pretty generic as far as bat and ball games go. Powerup icons aren't all that descriptive, infact you'll probably end up hitting the help button most of the time to determine if you should dodge it or collect it. Some of the icons just seem random. While the game does provide a red or blue outline depending on whether it's good or not, it still ends up being hard to see these outlines! The animations are pretty smooth though, so at least they're fun to look at.
The game is also rather lax on graphical effects. Broken pieces don't explode, or do anything, just a slow fade out. I was occasionally left wondering if I even hit the piece or not for a fraction of a second, which is not good when things speed up. This could be replaced, along with some other effects to liven things up. Ball trails, particle effects, something on the laser (which right now looks like a drill) would help the game's graphics a bit. Everything else is just simple movement. I even noticed a grammatical error. (the score indicator says "Scores") The backgrounds in the levels are on the most part good, with an occasional ugly one, such as the star field which has some sort of scrolling effect that just makes it look like it's having trouble to refresh.
Thankfully, the frame rate is smooth, as framerates in games like this are pretty essential; otherwise all your timing usually goes to shreds.
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Sound
The sounds in Another Ball are pretty weak. An occasional sound effect accompanied by some various beeps when you hit a piece, while other sounds just seem completely out of place like the laser weapon making some sort of gunshot or explosion. There are also a couple of voiceovers by what I would assume to be the developer, but these just seem out of place and feel somewhat last minute to me.
So the sound isn't great, but there also is background music, so that should help break things up right? Wrong. While the two ingame tunes are catchy, they're too short. They should either be short, and relatively ambient, or longer, and catchier, not both. This led me to turn all sounds off pretty quickly, and I'd have to recommend the same to most people.
Gameplay
To sum it up rather quickly: If you're looking for something similar to the original Araknoid, Another Ball is probably your choice. Otherwise, I'd have to recommend Bust Em, as it's just plain cheaper and has more variety than Another Ball.
The game itself is your simple bat and ball game with little variation. With 69 levels, you should be quite a while getting through the levels, along with the rather slow and laid back style of gameplay Another Ball features. There are a nice variety of powerups, although pretty much everything you've seen before.
There are a few annoyances scattered about. Namely, the loading seems way too long, and got on my nerves pretty easily. There's also no hardware button for pause, so if you're using the stylus, and need to pause, you need to tap quickly, as the pause button is on the top of the screen. A small bounding box merely complicates issues.
Nothing to complain about the controls, besides the location of the buttons at the top. Using the directional pad to control might be too fast for most people, however using the stylus is much more preferred on a PocketPC due to it's accuracy, although the pad is more true to the original.
I haven't encountered any bugs so far, and the game successfully handles power off and on with sound included.
Conclusion
Overall, there really just isn't much to say about Another Ball. It's an Araknoid clone, and while nothing is particularly wrong with it, the developers simply didn't go the extra mile and make Another Ball unique from all the others. With the rather high price, Another Ball simply isn't worth it unless you're looking for gameplay similar to the original. There are better, and some even free, versions out there for those who are willing to look a bit.
Breakdown (not an average)
Graphics: 6.5/10
Sound: 3/10
Gameplay 5/10
| Pros |
Cons |
- Decent drawn graphics
- Smooth animation
- Plenty of levels and powerups
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- Irritating loading
- Very basic sounds
- Too generic
- Expensive
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