Badland: Game of the Year Edition
Developed by: Frogmind Studios
Badland was a pretty popular app on smartphones developed by Frogmind Studios and it was an evolution of that annoying popular one button tap-fest, Flappy Bird. The premise in this game of the year edition is pretty much the same. You have to get to the end of the stage/day by hook or by crook, which can involve shrinking your character, making it bigger or have multiples to help navigate parts of the map that would be otherwise inaccessible.
It should be fun, on paper, and I would imagine that in the world of smartphones and tablets this is the case. The trouble is though, this is a CONSOLE. There are too many indie developers now trying to turn a simple app into a money spinning game, thinking the simplicity will be enough to earn it enough recognition on the bigger screen. In fact, this turns out to be quite the opposite, with the games often resulting in a lack of interest very quickly, due to the lack of interest that will inevitably appear over a short period of time.
The same has to be said of Badland. I looked at how it looked and the trailer and thought this may well be worth a punt, and don’t get me wrong, the price is not exactly a King’s ransom. The fun wears off quick enough, probably after 10 minutes or so, as although there are other things to think about, the main fundamental is exactly the same, press the A button until you get to the end. It really is that simple…. and dull.
The co-op and multiplayer elements would normally save something like this, but considering that these are local play and not online, this defeats the purpose in a day and age where more people are online than not. If this had been different we may well have been staring at a different outlook (and, more importantly, score) but this is useless and impossible to check when you don’t have enough people to come over to play it.
Because of this, for the first time in, well EVER, I am going to have to do a very short review. I can usually find enough in a game to talk about, throw about the pros and cons and even come up with some witty banter to keep you entertained. Badland just doesn’t cut it though, even as a game of the year, it is just dull, uninspiring and a complete waste of a sky diver (fiver).
What they all fail to get is that we all have smartphones now. We can play these things for a fraction of the price on our devices and some can even be put up on the TV through some magic or other, which deems console versions of games like these POINTLESS. There is completely no reason to buy this, unless you are a fan of simple games and can’t find the energy to get your phone out of your pocket. The review will have a point or two (let's live on the wild side), but it will be lucky to get any more.
In all honesty, this is just Flappy Bird with a hairball as a main character, some nice backdrops and a really repetitive mission. The saddest thing is that there could be some truly awesome level design and some great things to do later in the game, but you’ve lost interest that quickly you can’t be bothered to find out.
This just doesn’t cut it, I’m afraid.
DULL
Thanks to the Xbox Community for letting us review this game.