Review: Knights and Dragons
Score:
73%
Version Reviewed: 1.0.09
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Having already taken on the delights of a Rubiks cube, Five Deer Software present their version of the sliding puzzle game that’s variously known as Traffic, Blocks, or (in their case) Knights and Dragons.
It’s a logical puzzler, no timer, no evil creatures to stop you, just a case of using the grey matter to shuffle different sized bricks around the grid (the knights) until you can move the large 2x2 block (the dragon) to the bottom of the screen and out the door. I’m always a sucker for puzzlers like this, where there is always a solution, but to find it you’re going to have to fiddle, guess, plan or do whatever you have to do to get it all in place.
The interface, unsurprisingly, is very reminiscent of previous Five Deer titles, and is all easily understandable, with a splash screen for the main menu, a level selector, and then into the game. There are a couple of points where a press on the centre key doesn’t default to one of the soft key options, notably in the level selection screen, and I hope a future version will tweak this; because outside of this it’s very slick.
In the game itself, I was worried that a lack of a touch-screen or pointer device would make moving the blocks an interesting challenge. The solution here isn’t some sort of cursor/faux pointer, but numbered blocks. You tap the number of the block you want to move, and then you move them with the cursor. It’s definitely practical, but at times can be frustratingly slow when you have five or six blocks you need to move up in sequence, one block at a time.
Nevertheless it does provide a challenge, albeit one that is going to be a frustrating gaming experience – the 21 levels might also not last a huge amount of time. I’ve cleared ten levels in my first session playing the game. At $7 though, this isn’t such a huge deal as you might initially think it is. With good value, a solid UI, and a challenging game, this is another recommended title from Five Deers.
Ewan Spence, AllAboutSymbian
Reviewed by Ewan Spence at