Friday, November 5, 2010
0
Cestos 2 Review
★★☆☆☆
Prepare for some online, multi-player marble-on-marble action in Cestos 2 - a game reminiscent of shuffleboard with the added-bonus of perpetual face lifts!
Title: Cestos 2 | Developer: Chicken Brick Studios | Genre: Casual, Action |
Players: 2, 3, 4 | Version: 1.1 | Size: 6MB | Price: Free
Click QRC image (from phone) or scan with a barcode reader.
Cestos 2 is a game that plays in very short-bursts, and works something like a game of marbles using shuffleboard physics. You... are a marble. One with a Potato-Head'esque customizable face, no-less.
Once you sign-in (via Open Feint), you're dumped into a play-zone where you can join competitive games of two, three, or four players - most people seem to inhabit the four-player zone. After taking the jump, a random game-type is chosen from five available options - Pinball, Star Collector, Mine Field, Target Practice, and Black Hole - and you're dumped on the map with a ticking timer. If your lucky, your marble (with the arrow above it) isn't in the upper-left corner... because that's where the player list is. Before the timer runs-out, you tap and drag an arrow from your marble outwards, indicating both strength (longer or shorter) and direction. Once you're ready, you double-tap the screen to commit and then wait for the other players to do the same. Assuming nobody's dropped-out by this point, everyone takes their action simultaneously. After some time of bouncing-about, the game will end, you will be awarded some coins (or none, if you suck), and you can go buy some new bits and pieces to add to your mar-mar-mar-marble face mar-mar-marble face.
A little on the game types: Pinball has you ricocheting off pinball-style bumpers, earning points as you do so, and eventually destroying them all with enough hits. In Star Collector, you collect stars; yellow ones are worth the most, then orange, then grey. In Mine Field, well... there's a field of mines that you want to avoid (because they explode). In addition to the mines you start-out with, your marble leaves one behind - like an elephant lacking bowel control - every time you move. You each start with ten "lives", and the last marble standing wins! Target Practice is similar to billiards - each of you aims for the bulls-eye and shoots, and hopefully you end up in the middle. Finally, in Black Hole, your goal is to knock your opponents into the gaping void in the middle of the map.
That's about it! Play random game, get coins, upgrade face - rinse and repeat. The Market community seems to favor this game highly, ranking at four-stars, but... I don't get it. Perhaps it's the casual nature of the game that appeals to players, perhaps it's the multi-play, or perhaps the majority of people on the planet are really, really unhappy with their own faces? I'm not sure. Unfortunately, I've run into quite a few issues in my play-time with Cestos 2 that drag the score down.
First, there is no tutorial. I had to learn how to play all by my lonesome... sad panda. Second, even though there's a "music and sound" option in the Settings menu, I have yet to hear a peep out of this game. When I try to use the phone's rocker to raise the game volume, it only adjust the ringer volume. So, apparently (on the Evo at least), there is no sound. Aside from those two glaring issues, there are a host of minor frustrations. Two little annoying windows, one of which can be disabled, sit on every game-screen - usually directly above your marble. If you have big fingers, you'll find yourself aiming and re-aiming to get the arrow just right, since you can't really see under your big, fat fingers. And, occasionally, the game stalls-out when "finding players" or just spontaneously dumps you back to the menu screen.
Controls
Tap, drag, and double-tap. It's a little tricky to aim the arrow precisely, since the pointer is located beneath your fingertip (fat-finger issue).
Graphics
The graphics are decent-enough, but nothing to write home about. The game, graphically-speaking, feels pretty rudimentary and basic. It reminds me of a web-based Flash game, really.
Sound
Beats me! I can't hear anything.
Options
In the Settings menu, you can toggle music, sound effects, vibration, language filter, chat, and tips. You can also reset your account if you're tired of your marble.
Verdict
Cestos 2 is a casual, pick-up style game that might give you some entertainment for a while... until you realize there's really not much challenge, and no more than face-parts to work for. I might have given this game three stars, had it not been with all the aforementioned technical and game play irritants. It is free, however, which makes for a compelling argument when it comes to most games; even if they're just ok.
Get Cestos 2 on AppBrain!
Title: Cestos 2 | Developer: Chicken Brick Studios | Genre: Casual, Action |
Players: 2, 3, 4 | Version: 1.1 | Size: 6MB | Price: Free
Cestos 2 is a game that plays in very short-bursts, and works something like a game of marbles using shuffleboard physics. You... are a marble. One with a Potato-Head'esque customizable face, no-less.
Once you sign-in (via Open Feint), you're dumped into a play-zone where you can join competitive games of two, three, or four players - most people seem to inhabit the four-player zone. After taking the jump, a random game-type is chosen from five available options - Pinball, Star Collector, Mine Field, Target Practice, and Black Hole - and you're dumped on the map with a ticking timer. If your lucky, your marble (with the arrow above it) isn't in the upper-left corner... because that's where the player list is. Before the timer runs-out, you tap and drag an arrow from your marble outwards, indicating both strength (longer or shorter) and direction. Once you're ready, you double-tap the screen to commit and then wait for the other players to do the same. Assuming nobody's dropped-out by this point, everyone takes their action simultaneously. After some time of bouncing-about, the game will end, you will be awarded some coins (or none, if you suck), and you can go buy some new bits and pieces to add to your mar-mar-mar-marble face mar-mar-marble face.
A little on the game types: Pinball has you ricocheting off pinball-style bumpers, earning points as you do so, and eventually destroying them all with enough hits. In Star Collector, you collect stars; yellow ones are worth the most, then orange, then grey. In Mine Field, well... there's a field of mines that you want to avoid (because they explode). In addition to the mines you start-out with, your marble leaves one behind - like an elephant lacking bowel control - every time you move. You each start with ten "lives", and the last marble standing wins! Target Practice is similar to billiards - each of you aims for the bulls-eye and shoots, and hopefully you end up in the middle. Finally, in Black Hole, your goal is to knock your opponents into the gaping void in the middle of the map.
That's about it! Play random game, get coins, upgrade face - rinse and repeat. The Market community seems to favor this game highly, ranking at four-stars, but... I don't get it. Perhaps it's the casual nature of the game that appeals to players, perhaps it's the multi-play, or perhaps the majority of people on the planet are really, really unhappy with their own faces? I'm not sure. Unfortunately, I've run into quite a few issues in my play-time with Cestos 2 that drag the score down.
First, there is no tutorial. I had to learn how to play all by my lonesome... sad panda. Second, even though there's a "music and sound" option in the Settings menu, I have yet to hear a peep out of this game. When I try to use the phone's rocker to raise the game volume, it only adjust the ringer volume. So, apparently (on the Evo at least), there is no sound. Aside from those two glaring issues, there are a host of minor frustrations. Two little annoying windows, one of which can be disabled, sit on every game-screen - usually directly above your marble. If you have big fingers, you'll find yourself aiming and re-aiming to get the arrow just right, since you can't really see under your big, fat fingers. And, occasionally, the game stalls-out when "finding players" or just spontaneously dumps you back to the menu screen.
Controls
Tap, drag, and double-tap. It's a little tricky to aim the arrow precisely, since the pointer is located beneath your fingertip (fat-finger issue).
Graphics
The graphics are decent-enough, but nothing to write home about. The game, graphically-speaking, feels pretty rudimentary and basic. It reminds me of a web-based Flash game, really.
Sound
Beats me! I can't hear anything.
Options
In the Settings menu, you can toggle music, sound effects, vibration, language filter, chat, and tips. You can also reset your account if you're tired of your marble.
Verdict
Cestos 2 is a casual, pick-up style game that might give you some entertainment for a while... until you realize there's really not much challenge, and no more than face-parts to work for. I might have given this game three stars, had it not been with all the aforementioned technical and game play irritants. It is free, however, which makes for a compelling argument when it comes to most games; even if they're just ok.
Get Cestos 2 on AppBrain!
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