ExZeus

This game was released last Friday after I posted the video for it earlier in the week. I seem to have trouble with this game's name, though... I keep wanting to type ExZues (as I did for my preview announcement last week) or EzZeus. So if you're hunting for it in the Android Market pay careful attention to its spelling.

ExZeus is a 3D shooter. Essentially you control left/right/up/down movement and firing, but the game controls the forward movement as you travel through the levels towards an eventual boss encounter. The game bleeds action and firepower. The game also offers a lot of options allowing you to adjust the controls (tilting moves you around) both in terms of reversing the axis as well as sensitivity.

When I was first about to do this review I was left feeling like the game just wasn't my bag. It has too much going on too quickly for my taste and then I noticed something. A TUTORIAL? What the heck... as much as I don't like instructions maybe it has something interesting that I'm missing. After watching it all I can say is wow... this game has lots of options for firepower beyond the basic tap, tap to shoot bullets. First, you can lock on to enemies and fire missiles. Then you have a laser you can shoot with and bombs you can unleash. Furthermore, because the missiles feature a target locking system that takes some of the frustration away that I was experiencing when I was trying to operate exclusively with bullets. Bottom line... watch the tutorial FIRST.

As with HyperDevBox's other title, Love Catch, the graphics and sound are top notch. They also have developed the good habit of downloading all of the game's data files onto the storage card so that the game doesn't consume much of the Android's precious app storage space (how I wish everyone with a game over a meg would do that). The controls work well, too, and if you're into high speed, arcade titles this will be right up your alley.

As for me... not so much. It plays too fast for my old bones, but I'm not so blind as to see that this is a great game that will have its audience. I'm also appreciating that the developers included a Continue option so that those of us that don't have the arcade reflexes can, at least, work our way through the game's various boss robots. It takes someone like me an extra life or two... ok, 23... to get past that first level, but at least they allow me to see what's next. The game does feature online play as well and is a welcome addition to the Android Market. I'm looking forward to see what HyperDevBox's next creation is as they are clearly among the elite with their Android game development.