Price: $1.99 Score: 8/10 Category: Games
The Incident is a retro style avoid-the-falling objects game that relies on the accelerometer for primary controls and lightning fast reactions.
Everything about the game screams classic, from the 8-bit pixel art to the chiptune soundtrack by Cabel and retro style sound effects. Big Bucket Software skillfully bring you straight back to the days of Atari and it’s as fun as ever.
The idea behind The Incident is quite simple. To start each level you’re placed on a platform in the center of the iPad screen. The scene behind you is in the classic 8-pixel style and whether you’re in front of a building or near a mountain of trees depends entirely on where you are in the game.
Everything in the level happens in this box, so when the white bar starts flashing above you it’s your job to move out from underneath it as quickly as possible by leaning the iPad from side to side. To jump, you tap on the screen.
After a few flashes of that dreaded white line any of the game’s 100 objects will drop from the sky in a mad rush. Ladders, cabs, poles, tents, stop signs, presents, desks, arcade games, doors, and a wide variety of other tschotskes all drop from the sky, and when they do they build up on the platform below.
In addition to avoiding the objects personally, you can push objects around into piles, jump on them, and burrow your way out from underneath piles of stuff by shaking the iPad violently. All the while, a variety of balloons rise up from the ground in a series of power ups or power downs.
Balloons with crosses will give you an extra live while green balloons give you a temporary helmet and poison looking balloons hurt you. When you run out of lives you die and return to the beginning of the level, but beating the level is a matter of avoiding the falling junk until your platform builds up high enough to let you jump up to a line of flags.
Although there are only seven levels on the game, each level is surprisingly challenging. This isn’t a game you can skate through, but that’s okay. It just makes the trophy room that showcases your achievements that much more meaningful.
Bottom Line: The Incident is a simple and addictive retro style avoid-the-falling objects game that will have you shaking your iPad every which way.
