INC Review

Monday, November 21, 2011

INC Review

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INC Review

By Carter Dotson on November 21st, 2011
Our Rating:

:: OCCUPIED
Universal App - Designed for iPhone and iPad

INC is a comic book-inspired action-platformer from retro revival enthusiasts OrangePixel.

Developer: OrangePixel
Price: $1.99
Version Reviewed: 1.0.2
Device Reviewed On: iPod touch 4, iPad 2

Graphics / Sound Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
Game Controls Rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars
Gameplay Rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars
Replay Value Rating: 3 out of 5 stars

Overall Rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars

INC is the latest game from OrangePixel, continuing their run of retro-styled action-platformers. This goal in each level is to try and activate three boosters in order to open up the level gate. The game has a light storyline about futuristic mega-corporations taking over the world and replacing people with robots. As such, most enemies are either random goons dressed and armed to kill, or deadly robots of all shapes and sizes. Players can get stars for killing all enemies, activating all the boosters in underneath the time limit, and for finishing with extra health. Players also can earn experience from killing enemies that can be used to power up their main weapon.

INC is great for short pick up and play sessions; OrangePixel seems to have the pacing of their games down pat. The game features cloud-based saving through OpenFeint, so stars and experience can transfer between devices. I don’t just mean between iOS devices, either; even the Android version of the game can load up cloud saves. The OrangePixel pixel art style is well in effect here, and the balance of monochromatic characters and backgrounds works really well to give the game a distinct look. Remote controls are supported, from Joypad and iCade on iOS, to keyboard and Xperia Play support on Android.

The level-up system is very annoying, in that gaining points to level up is extremely slow, then a huge amount is lost on dying. Pretty much the only way to level up is to replay the early levels over and over again, so that dying in new levels won’t reduce the meter that much. It’s just an extremely poorly implemented and user-unfriendly element that should have been revised or scrapped entirely. A lot of boosters are hidden in the environment, and thus require the shooting of random blocks in order to discover them, which doesn’t feel all that fair.

INC is not perfect, but it’s another solid action-platformer from OrangePixel. Fans of games with cloud-based saves and remote control support will want to check this one out.