Review: Chaos and Mayhem
Score:
60%
Got your car stuck in a traffic jam or your yacht blocked in at the marina? Then your name is Joe, and you're the character in Trogaming's Chaos and Mayham. It's a sliding block puzzle game where you have to free yourself from a 21st Century mess of vehicles. Frustrating is the word of the day, both for the circumstances Joe finds himself in, and the code on offer in this game.
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Chaos and Mayhem may sound like a fantastic idea - can you help "Joe" out of all the vehicle jams he seems to get himself into? There's an exit that you need to get through, and you can move all the other vehicles around to clear a path.
Yes, it's the sliding block and escape puzzle game we've seen a number of times before. The question is not whether this is a good game (it is), the question is whether Trogaming have made a good implementation of the game.
It's a marginal call, but I'm going to say no.
All the desired elements are there, it's just that they don't seem to be working together to lift up the title from pedestrian into the fast lane. First up, the controls. Given this is a game where you slide something on a touchscreen phone, the natural choice has been made and works well. To move you tap, hold and slide. Simple, and relatively reactive.
The graphics on display have no life or zest. They are just there. Some of them are close to being photo-realistic, other look hand-drawn in the extreme. Because I know that it's a sea based level, I can guess that something is meant to be a sailing yacht, but it takes a minute for my brain to get it. You'd think that muddy graphics wouldn't stop a game about sliding blocks, but if you agree that great graphics make a game, then realise that poor graphics (or at least inconsistent style) can damage the perception as well.
Can I also flag up the sneaky way the puzzle count has been inflated. Rotating these 80 designs through the four cardinal directions, and flipping them to a mirror image gives 640 level variations. Factually accurate, and a nice touch to extend the game playing time, but I'll be honest, it feels icky.
Oh yes, when exiting the lite version, running a web browser instance of the Ovi Store to show me the full price version might be acceptable the first time you run the game. Arguably it's frustrating the second time it happens, but on the third time I was ready to shout very loudly in anger. I agree that Trogaming have to upsell from the lite to the full, but this method is taking it too far.
Add that up and what do you get? Well, it's not perfect, and neither is it in the upper echelons of gaming. Yes the game is there, but there's no zest, there's no life and there's nothing that makes the game fun to play. I'll pass, but your mileage may vary.
-- Ewan Spence, July 2011.
Reviewed by Ewan Spence at