The first non-Angry Birds game in more than two years from Rovio Entertainment hit the top spot on download charts on Thursday, showing the Finnish startup behind the world-famous gaming franchise was more than a one-hit wonder.
Rovio's new puzzle game, Amazing Alex, became the top paid app on the key United States App Store shortly after the launch. Amazing Alex is a physics-based game that features challenges that curious boy Alex has to solve.
"Launching new franchises has turned
out to be tough for even the most successful app
vendors, but Amazing Alex reached the Number One position in the iPhone Paid App chart in eight hours," said analyst Tero Kuittinen from Finnish mobile firm Alekstra.
Amazing Alex takes place in a young boy's messy house. Each level presents a different physics puzzle that involves cleaning up: you have to put balls in a bin, topple some books, or pop balloons. You then use the objects available to you to solve the puzzle, earning bonuses for each of the three stars you collect.
The physics puzzles are a little more clever than some games, because there isn't just one solution to every problem. You can place several pieces -- like shelves or pipes -- on a blank canvas to experiment with the game's physics. You don't also need every piece available to you (and they change every level) to solve a puzzle, meaning there is room fiddle with your designs.
This is where the game could have extra challenge, and it misses the boat. There are no time bonuses for solving a puzzle in one go, for not using all your pieces, or solving it an allotted time. The only achievement is collecting the three stars each level, which you'll have to do to unlock new sections of the game.
The game's difficulty isn't too challenging; the first few levels serve entirely as tutorial, and it won't be hard for you to breeze through the first couple of zones. The joy in the game lies more with its sandbox nature, and it challenges you to create whatever Rube Goldberg can most creatively solve the level. That might not satisfy the most achievement-hungry player, but it is far more creative and would be a great title to help kids' problem solving skills.
Rovio's new puzzle game, Amazing Alex, became the top paid app on the key United States App Store shortly after the launch. Amazing Alex is a physics-based game that features challenges that curious boy Alex has to solve.
"Launching new franchises has turned
vendors, but Amazing Alex reached the Number One position in the iPhone Paid App chart in eight hours," said analyst Tero Kuittinen from Finnish mobile firm Alekstra.
Amazing Alex takes place in a young boy's messy house. Each level presents a different physics puzzle that involves cleaning up: you have to put balls in a bin, topple some books, or pop balloons. You then use the objects available to you to solve the puzzle, earning bonuses for each of the three stars you collect.
The physics puzzles are a little more clever than some games, because there isn't just one solution to every problem. You can place several pieces -- like shelves or pipes -- on a blank canvas to experiment with the game's physics. You don't also need every piece available to you (and they change every level) to solve a puzzle, meaning there is room fiddle with your designs.
This is where the game could have extra challenge, and it misses the boat. There are no time bonuses for solving a puzzle in one go, for not using all your pieces, or solving it an allotted time. The only achievement is collecting the three stars each level, which you'll have to do to unlock new sections of the game.
The game's difficulty isn't too challenging; the first few levels serve entirely as tutorial, and it won't be hard for you to breeze through the first couple of zones. The joy in the game lies more with its sandbox nature, and it challenges you to create whatever Rube Goldberg can most creatively solve the level. That might not satisfy the most achievement-hungry player, but it is far more creative and would be a great title to help kids' problem solving skills.
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