UFOMania

U.F.O. stands for, Uniquely fun opportunity!

Reviewed by Joe Flowers

Game Statement

“Welcome to the Galactic Security Agency, cadet! Our mission is to rescue all humans from planets in danger and move them to more secure places. As a member of the G.S.A. you have been selected to carry abductees in some cities of planet D-25, also known as planet earth.”

The Object

In UFOMania, the object is to take your alien spacecraft and move the people of earth to another planet which is the safe zone. While avoiding obstacles such as helicopters, jets, and sometimes the very own people you are attempting to rescue; you must navigate your ship to avoid danger. The game is essentially two screens, the upper portion is the sky area where the drop point is and the other lower portion is where the city, enemies, and people to save are. You must pick up the humans with a left-click of your mouse and move the mouse to navigate your ship safely away from danger. Be careful! One can easily drop the humans by trying to navigate quickly or trying to run too fast. The ship also has a weight limit so don’t try to pick up too many! The level ends when you save all the humans. You are then given a score based upon your performance of humans rescued, humans killed (deduction), Time bonus, and life bonus (You start each level with 3 lives). After completing the game by either finishing all 5 levels or dying, you are then eligible for the high scores list at the featured website.

Features
-Music and sound effects.
-Comprehensive opening menu with,
-“How to play menu”
-“Credits”
-“High score list”
-Easy, Normal, and Hard modes.
-Music/Sound On and off button. (You’re gonna need this puppy!)

The Lowdown
UFOMania is a very nicely programmed game. A substantial amount of time and effort went into making it. The animation is smooth and the graphics are nice, yet simple. Nothing about the physics, animation, or control make the game lose its entertainment value. It sometimes can be frustrating to keep your humans from falling out of your ship’s grip, but this keeps the game challenging and is an intended feature. With highscore as the main objective, it’s refreshing to see the game isn’t painstakingly long. In one sitting of 5-10 minutes, one can achieve a game finish. Once the game is finished, the only reasons to play again is to better your score, or perhaps you just like it so much you want to play it again. Although replay value is existent, I found that I was kept entertained by this game for roughly 20 minutes before I decided to move on. The “Features” listed above are definitely a plus and I applaud this game’s author for them.

The only thing I found myself disliking about this game was the space/future-like ambient background “music”. After a very short amount of time I felt like driving my head through the monitor to stop the horrific nightmare of looping madness, reverberating within my ears. Instead I clicked the “Music Off” button which was a holy Godsend. Unfortunately I came to find out that it ALSO turns off the sound effects, which are nice and also necessary. The firing missiles from below are nice to hear and know about as your ship decends upon the lower half of the screen that you CANNOT see until you begin to lower your ship down to it.

Overall, the game was entertaining, fun, and exciting.


Click here to play UFOMania






Comments (0) [view all]
Click here to leave a comment