The Game

Snipers get all the chicks.

Your go by the name of Sergeant BJ Blazkowicz (Stop laughing.), an American soldier fighting in World War 2, and you have just escaped from a Nazi prison by overpowering a guard, taking his pistol, and shooting your way out. You try to round up other Allied prisoners and go deeper and deeper into Castle Wolfenstein, discovering that the Axis have been up to no good: genetically engineering super soldiers, creating an undead army, and building creatures so foul that the mere sight of them causes a chill to run down your spine. Alright, it wasn’t their sight that did that, it was the fact that they just blew their ice breath at you and froze you dead in your tracks.

Of course, as a sergeant in the Allied armies, none of this even makes you flinch. You bravely go where no man, woman, or very courageous dogs even think about going. You walk around shooting Nazi soldiers, blowing up walls, destroying tables and chairs, eating chicken, looting shelves, and mixing concoctions into syringes that give you extraordinary abilities. You’re going to need every single one of those extraordinary abilities (Alright, maybe you’ll only really need a handful of types of syringes.) because the enemies go from weak, little sissy soldiers to big, hulking, rocket-slinging beasts. To ensure that you do survive the much tougher enemies, you do get more and more powerful weapons like the machine gun and rocket launcher.

Fists of fury make everyone talk.

At your disposal are three types of weapons: Melee, Ranged, and Explosive. Melee is great for knocking the heads off of skeletons, beating up lesser minions, throwing toilets and sinks, and smashing those pesky tables and chairs. Ranged weapons let you bust a cap into bums all around you, going from pistols to assault rifles to sniper rifles, this will be your bread and butter for most of the game. Explosive weapons include sticks of dynamite, which you can use to blow up enemies, set traps, or open up cracked walls for secrets, and a rocket launcher which blows up whatever stands in its path. You control everything at your disposal using an on-screen d-pad and heads up display, simple enough controls especially for someone as awesome as you. There are also several medals you can attain from every level from achievements such as reading every book, destroying every object, or killing every single one of your enemies, and more!

Cool guys don’t look at explosions.

Graphics

Wolfenstein RPG comes with graphics that stay true to the original, using flat textures that are drawn according to the perspective of the player. Nothing special, but the retro feeling is well encapsulated and it runs ever so smooth.

Sound

The soundtrack for Wolfenstein RPG is only existent in the main menus, but it has a subtle army-march feeling to it that fits the game quite appropriately. Otherwise, the sound effects in the game are superb – from the cracks of bones, to the sounds of fists pounding faces, all the way to the sounds of rockets exploding in the distance.

Conclusion

Wolfenstein RPG is a fantastic adaptation of the original version – the turn-based aspect of the game allows both casual and more hardcore gamers to enjoy the game without relying on insane twitch-reflex abilities. In addition, the RPG elements of the game add a greater level of depth that make Wolfenstein RPG one of those titles that you definitely must have on your iPhone or iPod Touch.

The Game

Star Hogs is a great turn-based strategy game, you control a fleet of ships who must face off with other ships who are of different colour. That’s right, I just pulled out the colour card. Anyhow, you purchase ships to add to your armada, and there are three different types according to how you wish to use the ships. There are Combat, Engineering, and Intelligence ships, all of which have different statistics. For example, Combat ships have the best thrust, Engineering ships can carry the most and have the best armour, and Intelligence ships have the highest amount of shields. In addition, the set up of the ships will be different, specifically the number of Arms, Hull, and Tech slots each ship has.

Star Hogs has several options of play: Campaign, Free Play, and Online. Campaign is a great way to learn game mechanics, see the different types of environments available and how gravity affects them all (“Holy crap it’s going AROUND the planet!”) and unlocking different types of weapons for outfitting on your ships. Free Play is great practice on up to three other AI-controlled teams with anywhere from 1-4 ships. Online should be the bread and butter of Star Hogs, because you can square off with players around the world and show them who has bigger missiles. I said “should” be the bread and butter because online has its problems: connectivity issues when trying to log in and the lack of actual players playing the game. It really needs more people online, so get this game!

A lot of people will be comparing Star Hogs to the Worms franchise, and that is a fair comparison. They are both turn-based strategy warfare games, they have many weapons in their arsenal, your team has limited health, weapons are affected by gravity, and you’re fighting on a flat environment that is destructible. Those are the handful of similarities that you will find between Worms and Star Hogs, but it begins to deviate from there. Star Hogs sometimes feels like a simpler version of Worms, but it is really a different experience altogether.

Graphics

Star Hogs has fantastic graphics, using 3D models set on a flat landscape that gives the game a really great sense of depth. The planets are beautifully rendered, and overall, the graphics in Star Hogs are some of the best 3D modeling I have seen for iPhone games. Unfortunately, it just isn’t as nice looking as it could be as a 3D model, but it still does a bang up job.

Sound

Star Hogs has a pretty rock-centric soundtrack, which fits in perfectly with each round starting off with “Rock and Load!” There really isn’t much to say about the sound of Star Hogs, it is decent and it gets the job done, and you always have the option of playing your iPod instead of the in-game sound.

Additional Comments

I really wish more people played online, because then it would be a better experience. For now, a good number of people play at any given time, but either they suck real bad or they outright destroy you, some people in the mid-range would be nice!

Conclusion

Star Hogs is a quality game made for the iPhone by a fantastic independent developer based in Vancouver. (Gotta support fellow Canadians!) You will enjoy blasting the crap out of computers and other players alike, definitely a must have game for the iPhone!