Glowdot Productions has just released what is quickly becoming my favorite iOS game. Playground Wars is a colorful, unique strategy game that has lots of complexity but still is easy enough to play with one hand while sipping your coffee.
The lush playground world is full of color and character.
You play Alex, leader of a rag-tag band of kids who must defend their neighborhood playground from the mean kids from the next block over. The game recalls all sorts of childhood ‘weaponry’ such as plastic swords, split-wads, squirt guns, slingshots and other basically harmless items.
Your goal is different in each level. You might have to defend your base from a predertmined number of bullies or make your way over to their treefort and destroy it. The boss battles later in the game are amazingly epic. Huge cobbled-together cardboard tanks and robots take a true strategy to defeat. Aside from upgrading your weaponry, you can call upon various troops who serve different roles; squirt gun infantry helps hold back the enemy line and toddlers with rolled-up newspapers make up your invading footsoldier force. It’s a fun take on the genre and plays like a Star Ocean battle. All of this is compimented by spot-on voice acting and gorgeous lush backgrounds the capture the suburban wonderworld of little kids.
Boss battles are also pretty impressive! Check out that spit-wad tank gun!
The strategy elements in this game are not lacking. Each level is a day of the week with its own weather and conditions that effects gameplay. For example, squirt guns do more damage in the winter and snowy days and work less well on rainy days. Toddlers can’t be called as easily at nighttime since its past their bed time. The strategy keeps things interesting and really matters after you pass the first few levels.
I was called on to do some music late into the project so I only did a few tracks. I’m pretty happy with the result though. It was fun to make some music that was suppose to be epic and yet a little childish and fun too. I think we nailed it!
BeatScribe 