Tasty Planet Back for Seconds Review

14/05/2016
by thezombiechimp.com
0

Guest Article: The Zombie Chimp

Indie games can be like those TV program you channel hop through at 4am when you can’t sleep. There’s some that’s not your thing, there’s a few where you wonder how they got on TV in the first place, and by contrast there are those that are so genius and entertaining you wonder why they’re not on at a more mainstream time. Tasty Planet Back for Seconds is a game that fits into the final category.

Before I go into just why I find this game so entertaining, I should tell the story of Tasty Planet’s protagonist, a blob of grey goo.

After a scientific experiment led by a more-than-a-little-mad scientist goes slightly awry, a tiny blob of grey goo escapes into a nearby time machine, and gets transported back into prehistoric times. This time-travelling blob has an insatiable appetite, and wants to eat anything smaller than itself. Ultimately not so much of a problem except for the fact that eating makes the blob grow bigger, so can therefore eat larger and larger things accordingly. If you are what you eat, then the blob can be anything from a microbe to a volcano. Everything is fair game for this peckish little invertebrate.

Right, not the deepest and most captivating of storylines, I admit but there are games with worse storylines out there. Each level requires you to munch your way through, eating anything smaller and avoiding anything larger until you’re large enough to eat them. As you eat you grow, and if you reach a certain size you win the level. There is a time limit if you want to try and win a bronze, silver or gold medal, but as long as you don’t hit too many enemies, you’re almost certainly going to survive. Some of the levels are a basic munch-fest while others require you to navigate a maze or to eat things before other predators eat them before you.

There is no difficult control method to remember, with either the mouse or keyboard controls all you need to do is move the blob around the screen. I found that the mouse controls were a little floaty, but it didn’t take me long to get the hang of it. If you download Tasty Planet for your mobile device then you control the blob around by tilting your device, which is a little trickier than standard keyboard and mouse controls.

Looking at the graphics, there is an old school charm to it. They’re not going to knock your socks off, but the style and level is appropriate for the type and style of the game, so there are no complaints from me here.

The music accompanying you through all of this is a chirpy and catchy affair. I’m rather embarrassed to say that I found myself humming it one day. Think of the lift music they’d play in a toy store elevator and you wouldn’t be too far off.

So, you may be wondering if the story’s ok, and the sound and graphics are just so-so then what the hell is making this game so wonderful in my eyes. Well, it’s the Holy Grail of indie game development, addictability (Which, I know isn’t technically a word, but let’s ignore that). Because the gameplay is so simplistic and you can’t really fail to complete a level unless you really try, you are constantly moving forward, at your own pace. If you want to complete every level on gold, well go ahead and do that. Some people may say that there isn’t enough challenge, but to me in this case I can overlook it.

There you have it. Tasty Planet back for Seconds is a fantastically playable little game for just over a fiver on Steam and a couple of quid on the Apple store. As far as I’m concerned, it’s a fun little game, with a simple control method, and fun and bouncy graphics that keeps you coming back. You can’t really ask for more.