Well, this is cool. Super Stickman Golf 2 is a real thing, and it’s coming “later this year" to iPhone and iPad, creator Noodlecake studios has revealed on our message board.
According to the post, Stickman Golf 2 will have “all the classic features and modes you know and love," as well as some pretty exciting additions. New maps, power-ups, hazards, and collectibles will be part of the package. A new puzzle mode will be introduced, too, ushering in some scenario-based content for advanced players. Oh — and asynchronous play has been confirmed.
We’ve got some screens of the new game below this text stuff, so check them out. You can also check out the original Super Stickman Golf [Free], which is beloved by our community and staff, right now for the price of $0.
In the first few paragraphs, you condemn the game for being based on a notably-terrible cult film. Then in the last paragraph, you say that the movie is 'pretty entertaining'.
More importantly, most of this review is spent complaining about finding the film and how bad the source material is. 17 paragraphs, and the game is talked about (in terms of how it plays, looks and feels) in 2 of them.
Your final conclusion appears to be that the game falls apart as a hardcore retro platformer because it isn't well-designed. But there isn't any discussion on how the game plays, and why the design doesn't work, except that it's weird and doesn't make a lot of sense.
Whether you liked the game or not is irrelevant: this review is completely devoid of any critical thought, a freshman attempt at bringing 'voice' into a review, through the use of some bullet points and meaningless metaphors ("nostalgia is like a quick burning fuel"), with an underhanded insult to gamers who like titles the average gamer might find frustrating or inaccessible.
Glad to see this review had a short run at the top spot - its absent of coherency, or really any kind of intelligent critical thought on any level.
Manos - The Hands of Fate suffers not because it is hard, but because it isn’t well designed.
This is all that the review really needs. It's pretty much my feelings after playing. The design is horrible and it creates an artificial difficulty that isn't fun. Good review guys.
I absolutely disagree with this review. I picked up Manos last Thursday and had a blast playing it. Once I hit level 5 and finally got the Game Over screen I looked up to see that I'd been playing for over 20 minutes and really enjoyed myself.
Obviously, to each his own, but if you enjoyed playing Action platformers back in the NES days I think you'll enjoy this game. I had a lot more fun playing Manos than I do playing 'how fast can you swipe the screen' games like Infinity Blade.
I enjoyed playing platformers back in the NES days and now, and this game is absolutely nothing like any platformers I've ever played. Kudos to the dev for effort, but the execution wasn't there.
Out of curiosity, did you play it on the iPhone or iPad? I've only played it on an iPad 3 and I thought it played great.
However, I did notice that if I mirrored my display to my AppleTV it would lag the controls on the iPad and make the game extremely difficult. If people are seeing that same kind of lag on the phone then I can understand the criticism.
I agree with Donald. As both an old school Platformers fan and a fan of B-movies...I felt Manos really delivered.
I thought the controls were just fine and the game play was fun. The lack of continues was annoying, but less so when high scores are based on speed of completion. I certainly didn't find it overly difficult or all that badly designed. Plays he nods to other Cult B-Movies were great. I loved seeing Tom Servo, Ro-Man and the Giant Claw make appearances.
Plus the ideas used to make it a game were pretty clever. Using the ugly-ass sculpture that was in the couples room for a boss fight borders on something close to genius.
Plus to say it plays like Friday the 13th (not a plat former) and Nightmare on Elm Street is just basically wrong. It plays like those games the same way it plays like Super Mario Bros. meaning it's only similarity is being a plat former. If I was to make any comparison at all, it would be to Castlevania, which I think it takes the bulk of its inspiration from. Appspy gave it a 3out5 normally and a 4out5 if you got the joke. I think in this rare case I'll stick with that review.
Agreed. I think the reviewer expected something else. Honestly I don't really care about the source material. I think that's part of the charm and the joke- being a "crappy tie in" to a move no one saw. The NES days had tons of these
This game is fun.
A tad harsh isn't it? I found it to be a pretty fun throwback to the NES days. The controls aren't the best but they work well enough.
Im enjoying it as a cheap nostalgic platformer, wasn't expecting something high end.
Sh*t - I really like Manos. Had a proper blast playing it.I didn't realise I had such bad taste. Each to their own I suppose.
Agreed! I loved the game. I don't understand how the controls are bad at all, these are the best controls I've experienced on iOS, with League of Justice a close second.
I've racked up at least 7 or 8 hours playing this game since I bought it last week. Just like an old fun NES game.
Shame - I'm quite a fan of the movie - or at least they mythos and reasoning behind it. And for those who may be interested http://www.manosinhd.com
I dunno, I kinda dig it. Besides the whole campy-tenuous-tie-in feel, it really bugs me that there's no good side scrollers on the iPhone. Most of them are short levels to get three stars in, like they're Angry Birds or something. It was nice to see someone try a more MetroidVania approach.
I want to say that I love you all and I'm sorry we have different opinions about Manos. At least we can all agree that Prometheus was the best film of the summer. Am I right or am I right?
I hated the game on my first play through on my iPhone 4, it wasn't until I played it on my iPad 3 that I started to really enjoy it. It's either a bit unresponsive on the iPhone or the buttons have been shrunk a bit too much to stop them blocking the screen, causing them to be easily missed.
I thought it was more based on the Famicom game Splatterhouse Wanpaku Graffiti given the way they both spoof various horror films, have similar shotgun power-ups and can level-up your health. Either way, the NES retro look is really awesome and I would love to see more games like this as I really enjoyed it. It does have some difficulty spikes that make it a bit unwelcoming on the first few plays, especially the insta-kill flying level but I think it's going to be on my iPad for quite a while!
a) Friday the 13th and Nightmare are some of the "worst" NES games? News to me. Give X-Men, Predator, Hunt for Red October or Hudson Hawk a try sometime - those are all FAR worse licensed cashins.
b) You seem to have missed the whole appeal of the game - that it's a campy tie-in to a campy film. It's not supposed to be some golden masterpiece of 8-bit gaming.
c) For what it is, it's actually a pretty enjoyable experience - decent 8-bit action with a lot of in-jokes to notoriously bad B-movies. It may not be a masterpiece, but it did have a few clever moments, which more than I can say for most "retro" cash-ins I've played that seem to think being "dated and mediocre" automatically equates out to being "fun". (I'm looking at you, "Nostalgia" on the DS).
Personally, I'm enjoying this game...
This review is super harsh to my mind. I'm really enjoying the game.
What the heck?! All week Manos is 5 star. I check in today and it's down to 2 star. Then I understand: it got a big long bad review. Luckily I'm not the only one disturbed by this, and a lot of people have already defended the game. So I'll just throw in my 2 cents and say I bought it and I'm playing it and I love it. The artwork is great, the gameplay is great, and the controls are pretty good on my iPhone 4. And if you're a "fan" of the crappy cult movie, there's lots of hilarious references. 5 stars all the way IMO.
Jeez, I'm loving this game. I thought the cheeky NES slaughtering of the movie's story was hilarious and the gameplay was spot on.
I do believe that the intent of the reviewer was to point out that just because a game has camp value, doesn't mean that it is good. "Campy" movies have been known to range all over the place in terms of actual quality, while they can still be immensely enjoyable (see: Troll 2). Games that are based on campy movies that have questionable quality have a tendency to deliberately be terrible, and/or have questionable design choices that mimic the bad/good quality of the film, in an effort for the game to be an accurate reflection of the source material... ideally, that is. Sometimes, a game just fails regardless of intent, but that is a tangent to my point.
As far as I can tell, the reviewer's intent was to point out this fact. However, he did not qualify to its fullest extent just HOW MUCH this fact applies to the game he reviewed. If he had spent more time on the game itself, there would be far less negative feedback, since he would be judging the game more on its own merits rather than by a related, yet poorly connected and incompletely explained fact.
The goal of the review was clear. However, we, the readers, didn't understand how the reviewer came to that goal, and why. Sometimes, reviewers slip, and that's okay. We're human. I would say for the reviewer to keep this in consideration when something similar crosses his plate again, mainly so he can give the game a more objective analysis.
-Mr. Album
Boo, this is a GREAT game!!!
I think the reviewer was confused and reviewed the movie! Why so much on the movie?
Anyways, I'm glad I'm not the only one who feels this review is way off. :)
Who the hell cares about the movie? This is one of the worst reviews I've read on TA.This game kicks butt and nails the NES-style perfectly.
Yeah, like many others here I think this game is pretty excellent. I'll just stick with user ratings.
Lots of duplicate IPs in these comments...
I think I might have to watch out for reviews written by this guy from now on. It's just so... off.
Boy, I'm glad I decided to go with 10000000 this week! I almost got this instead.
Rambling, unnecessarily verbose review that doesn't focus on the game. Personally, I like this game for what it is, not for how well (or not) it manages to imitate NES games or represent various imagery from a film I have never seen.
And to look at an angle other commentators haven't yet, for crying out loud GET A BOOK. "Manos" is Spanish for "hands", you don't ask "Who is Manos?", unless you live in a cave without access to effin' Google.
2 Stars? SERIOUSLY? I aint gonna take a review by Brendan serious anymore since today. This game is great.
So, I'm not reading a review by this guy anymore. 2 stars? Wow.
Is that Tom Servo in that first Screen shot? :D
Yes, should be, as far as I know!
You could easily mistake this for a review of the movie and not the game as more time seems to be spent on the former.
As far as viewing an "untouched" version of the movie, the reviewer couldn't have searched very hard. One need only to search the Internet Archive for a copy. No "peanut gallery" jokes on this one, so you might want to prepare yourself for a painful viewing experience. I'm sure it's also on YouTube. Or you can wait for the HD version that Tomate Diseño linked to, to come out and "clearly" see why it's a bad movie.
As for the game, I haven't tried it yet. I'm waiting for a PC version.
You can also search for the term "Manos" in the app store. The whole movie is there in an app for 99 cents. I found it by accident after reading this review! And yes, it's a very painful viewing experience without the MST3K commentary. As I have said several times already, the game is great. Yay developer :)