Smartphone & Pocket PC magazine - Comments for "REVIEW: CrazySoft releases puzzle adventure game â€œLost in the Pyramidâ€ for PPC / Smartphone / Palm"

There is also a very bad review of the game HERE.

Thanks for joining our discussion, PocketGoddess!

While I don't debate Palm OS has some extremely good games not available for Pocket PC (see for example Acedior and Fade), the majority of current games (not to speak about gaming console emulators) are released for the Pocket PC and now that Palm OS is going to die, the situation gets even worse.

As far as color matching titles are concerned on the two platforms, both Bejeweled and Bejeweled 2 have great in-game music. The former was entirely and the latter partly composed by Skaven (the composer of the PC FPS megahit Unreal). The (in both titles stereo - as far as the music is concerned, it's only in the original Bejeweled that it's played back in stereo, not in the second part) sound effects are also really-really nice. (BTW, for anyone interested: the tracked music in BJ2 is 30 minutes long. Fortunately, it's freely accessible in the home directory of the installed game - as is the case with the three s3m modules with the first part.)

If you do like listening to a game (personally, I love to - I even have a high-end A2DP headset), then, I really don't think these two Astraware titles have any serious contender.

If you don't want / need sound / music, then, I agree Paintball can be a worthy alternative. However, even then I think free (!) titles like the above-mentioned Snowed In 5 - Flaked Out can prove to be a better choice (for example, Snowed In 5 is also high-resolution on VGA devices) simply because of their price.

BTW, thanks for mentioning the pocketgoddess.com reviews (for anyone interested, http://www.pocketgoddess.com/articles/2005/07/paintball_2.html and http://www.pocketgoddess.com/articles/2004/04/pocketgoddess_r_34.html ).

I don't really want to comment on so-called "reviews" that don't list a single cons about the reviewed game / application. Can, for example, anyone point out ONE review written by me (I've written over a thousand of them so you have a lot to choose from) that ONLY lists the pros of a game / app and only uses the words "perfect", "GREAT" (with caps) and "superb"? I wouldn't call even the best games (say, K-Rally, Fade or Edge) or applications (say, Opera Mobile, LogMeIn etc.) "perfect" because I'm well aware of their weaknesses (and I do list them all in my reviews).

Furthermore, pocketgoddess.com is a Palm site. A game that is great on the Palm isn't necessarily great on Pocket PC, primarily because the latter has MUCH more alternative games to choose from / to compare a given title to.

Finally, as far as your sentence "Anyway, you may say that i am Crazysoft supporter but then again i could say the same thing for you concerning Astraware" is concerned: I couldn't ignore the .gr country code in your mailing address ;) (CrazySoft is a Greek company.) If you do try to look unbiased, try using an e-mail address that isn't originated from the same (small) country as the company. Also, sometimes "less is more": if you list a lot of delicate stuff about CrazySoft's titles not many would know (for example, the Handango Top 10, links to reviews and secret stuff in their latest title, only available for 2-3 days, which also mean few people may have discovered it if at all), your being unbiased and not connected with the developer will surely be questioned.

BTW, I also recommend the pocketplayers.de review linked above. If you can't speak the language and the Babelfish "translation" isn't clear enough, I may translate the review myself to show you I'm not alone with the "this game could easily be better"-approach.

Thanks for the feedback!

Well, a game's addictiveness, for me, greatly depends on the in-game music. I don't think anyone would seriously state the in-game music in Bejeweled isn't addictive.

I do know AstraWare's titles have certain drawbacks (for example, because of low(er)-quality / mono in-game music or QVGA resolution only) compared to some other titles. This is why, for example, I (still) recommend Fade over AstraWare's Broken Sword for "real", text-based adventure fans or DragonBall over AstraWare's Zuma. That is, I'm in no way a blind supporter of AstraWare.

Paintball 2 does have some plusses compared to Bejeweled (for example, support for VGA resolution) but, in my opinion, the complete lack of in-game music & quality (!) sound effects is a big letdown. It's the audio compartment that Bejeweled really rocks at; also, it's because of the audio effects / music that I recommend Bejeweled the most in this category. This, however, doesn't mean other games of the same genre are bad - it's just that I recommend Bejeweled the most.

As far as Lost in the Pyramid is concerned, there is a simple reason for my not really recommending it: the 1. scrolling-based messages 2. the sudden deaths are really tiring and really chases away any kind of fun, and this is crowned by the pretty weak in-game hand-drawn graphics. I don't debate the game is (or at least tries to be) funny in a way - it's just that I don't recommend it as much as more established titles, particularly not for seasoned, serious (!) adventure players. The latter will surely find Pyramid just lacking.

As early as the developer fixes at least the scrolling messages (by providing, say, static message boxes) and, preferably, eliminates the silly Yes/No-based deaths, I will be more than willing to reconsider my recommendation - as I've done to many other software titles I haven't recommended with their initial version, but, after the subsequent fixes and changes, I've also started to recommend them.

BTW, as far the price of Lost in the Pyramid is concerned, the price of Fade has just been reduced for $7.50 for the entire month (see my other news post on this). Even if you DO find the voucher in this game, Fade still remains cheaper - and, in my opinion, much easier / pleasing to play.

I thought this game looked pretty bad, but when I saw the price tag I didn't even give it another thought.

Smartphone &amp; Pocket PC magazine - Comments for "REVIEW: CrazySoft releases puzzle adventure game â€œLost in the Pyramidâ€ for PPC / Smartphone / Palm"

Smartphone & Pocket PC magazine - Comments for "REVIEW: CrazySoft releases puzzle adventure game â€œLost in the Pyramidâ€ for PPC / Smartphone / Palm"