Illusion Labs is easily one of our favorite iPhone developers. Each of their iPhone titles so far have taken clear advantage of the platform’s unique abilities in order to produce compelling gaming experiences. Illusion Labs has been responsible for the sort-of-platformer Sway as well as the finger skateboarding game TouchGrind. Both of these titles used multi-touch in a well-thought out control method that really complimented the gameplay of each.
When you look back at their first iPhone game Labyrinth, you may now consider it to be relatively primitive, but at the time of its release, Labyrinth really set the standard for ball rolling games. According to the developers, Labyrinth has been downloaded over 10 million times since its launch.
For their next game, Illusion Labs is going back to these early roots and is finally producing a sequel to the original ball roller with Labyrinth 2. After having spent some exclusive hands-on time with the game, I can already say it’s great.
Like the original game, the goal of Labyrinth 2 is to get the silver ball from the starting point to the goal while navigating walls and avoiding the holes. In the first version, that was pretty much all there was to it. Labyrinth 2, however, adds a number of new elements that graduate the game from simple wooden toy simulator to arcade game.
These elements include cannons, bumpers, doors/switches, magnets, fans, resizers, merry-go-round, duplicators, lasers and more. Navigating the levels still require careful tilt control to avoid falling to your death, but are also more puzzle/goal driven as you must also figure out how to make it to the exit. Levels are timed as before so beating your individual high scores remains the motivator to play a level again. This time, however, they’ve added a ghost ball representation of your best time for you to directly compete against.
Beyond the compelling core gameplay, the developers have also added a couple of additional features that should extend the game’s life indefinitely.
Like the original, players can create their own levels with a fully featured web-based editor. These free user creations can be sorted by popularity and rating and can be downloaded directly to your device. Finally, the game offers a very nice local multi-player setup over both bluetooth and Wi-Fi. This lets you play up to 4 people on the same board. In this case, all of the player’s balls will appear on each other’s screens — similar to ghost ball replays, but played in real time. All players movements are reflected on everyone else’s devices so you know exactly how far ahead or far behind you are. First to the goal wins, and a running score is kept as you continue playing across any of the levels. I suspect this feature alone will cause the game to spread like crazy amongst offices and schools.
The developer’s intro trailer starts with a cinematic and later shows actual gameplay:
There’s been no official release date, but Labyrinth 2 should be coming soon and it’s definitely one to look forward to.
Ugh... I guess I'll be buying this!! I love a good turn based game.
I have really enjoyed this game. The story is well told and the graphics and animations are great.
However, I have to whole heatedly disagree about the AI. I have noticed the AI making consistent and obvious blunders. For instance one mission I played (this has happened more than one it was just particularly pronounced in this mission) the AI attacked my Sabertooth(heavy armor) with its Shadow(weak scout unit). The Shadow died doing no damage. Next turn it attacked my Sabertooth with another Shadow. This Shadow (already injured) died doing no damage. This continued for 6 turns. In each turn the AI would attack and do no damage while loosing a Unit. At the end of each turn it would buy more Shadows. This was particularly weird because the AI had 2 Mega-Mechs(heavy armor) only 2 squares away. I have also been in several missions where the AI contained Dragons (its long range missile units). I have yet to see the dragon actually attack me (even when my units have been in range).
I don't want to overstate my case, I do really enjoy the game (and I see a lot of potential). I do hope that there is a patch to address some of the obvious AI deficiencies.
*hoping for one more frontpage review of RP* =\
Campaign Mission 4, Mexico City, is going to ruin this game for a lot of people, which is unfortunate. It won't ruin the game for everyone, obviously. But it's going to hamper a lot of people's ability to enjoy this game. It's somewhat similar to what the cop chase event does to Asphalt 5
It's true. I got so bored by round 50 on Mexico City that I just didn't want to play any more.
I'm surprised they would put such amateur level design in, especially so early in the game.
"Basic mechanics feel like a stripped down version of what Advance Wars offers. You’ll move, attack, and produce units. In terms of actual gameplay, that’s the bulk of what you’ll need to know"
When does being a "stripped" down version of an already simple game become a positive?
This review is quite a bit off on more than one take.
Munkie!
Thanks for the review, I enjoyed Advance Wars and still have it somewhere but play with my iPhone a lot more these days. Bought it just now.
I'm enjoying it. Very attractive game.
Has anyone confirmed flying units? I'm guessing there aren't any, based on the early observation that mountains are wholly impassible.
Anyone?
The lack of an undo is really a problem (unless you discover new units after the move) because it's really easy to fat finger the suicide and then you're done. I'm sorry but completely destroying your own unit is a good candidate for a confirm option.
I don't really understand why Uniwar doesn't have more people playing. It is by far the app I've spent the most amount of time on, and I've spent more than $100 on various apps. The online multiplayer is fantastic. It's on my front page, and the push notification allows me to not have to check constantly to see if its my turn.
For me, multiplayer is the most important thing, and until this game gets good online multiplayer support, I don't think it will be a sell for me.
Two reasons, I think--
One, the single player campaign kind of sucks. Especially the AI that takes way too long to make a move. I know you don't have to finish the campaign to play multiplayer but most people want to learn the game that way; and I think a lot of people write the game off when they have to deal with the awful AI and never make it to multiplayer mode.
Two, a lot of the maps give one side and/or race a big advantage, if not a guaranteed win if the player knows what they're doing. I was a big fan of the game but I gave it up when I realized this; just about everyone you play who isn't a complete newbie tends to use the exact same foolproof strategies (and often same order of moves.) So there really needs to be new maps and modes of play or just an overhaul of things if they're going to keep going, because I think a lot of players are getting bored and dropping out.
I'm a fan of Uniwar. Yes, there are a few maps that might give an advantage to a certain race, but you can always choose not to play such a map - and there are a LOT of maps in Uniwar. As for the single player campaign, I played through it once and never looked back. I've since played hundreds of online mulitiplayer games which are so good that no other iphone game has been able to hold my attention for more than a day - and I've spent hundreds on iphone games. Some may look better, some may have a better pedigree, but none have been able to touch Uniwar multiplayer. And when Uniwar updated with push notification it just put the nail in the coffin to all other tbs games. Single player games are a dime a dozen... there's nothing like playing vs. a cunning human.
I'm not disagreeing with you about single player, but I am saying it turns people off who would otherwise play multiplayer. Meaning there's a smaller community than if the single player aspect was more engaging. Most people don't just jump into multiplayer when they don't know how to play the game, after all, so they go through the campaign first, and when the campaign is flawed they lose interest and move on.
As far as maps go, I playing a LOT over the summer and into September, I was very active in the community and on the forums, and I learned all the "tricks." There really isn't a single map where one side and one race doesn't have a significant advantage, if not a guaranteed win. All of this is pretty common knowledge as well amongst those who play a lot. While the game can still be fun, you pretty much have to agree with the other player NOT to use the tried-and-true winning strategy (or race/map combo) ahead of time to make it a challenge once you figure all the tricks out.
I still have high hopes for the game and I know they're making a sequel so maybe they'll work out the kinks. It is a great game, especially considering it's on the iphone, but but you ask why the community is small and these are the reasons why I think people get either turned off in the beginning or bored in the end.
is it just me or does the art look like a sequel to the mass effect iphone game?
Good review! I think I'll be getting this.
Small typo: "Battle FOR Wesnoth".
I'm several levels in and quite enjoying the game. It can be a little cumbersome to move and attack, at least compared to UniWar, but I like the mechanic of armor units having limited fuel & ammo. It adds an extra element to have to keep things supplied by the tanker truck or nearby cities. I would disagree with the AI being brilliant. It is good at going for weak targets, but as Patrick said, units will happily suicide on my heavy tanks all day, with little or no damage done. To be fair, UniWar has the same problem though.
My other criticism so far is that the resources given tend to be too generous, and I have found little reason to use the regular soldiers or light tanks. With a square grid (vs. hex), the main challenge is maneuvering everything into place, not making tough choices about which units you can build.
But if I'm complaining about strategy, it usually means I'm enjoying the game enough to think about it, which is better than 95% of the iPhone games out there.
Are you for real? What do you think Civ Revolutions is, chopped liver? It's the granddaddy and big kahuna of all turn based strategy games, for crying out loud.
I see this as quite the bias review. Not up to the normal quality of TA.
How can you say that ?
you haven't even play at Rogue Planet...
I play this game since 2 days and really, it's a great game, not perfect, by far, but great.
The story, the gameplay, the art. All is at very high level not only for an iphone game but for a console game.
what about hot seat multiplayer? Is it in the game?
I'm enjoying the game but I'd like to echo some of the complaints already made.
1: it's way too easy to make a mistake by hitting the wrong command. There should be an undo button.
2: The AI is horrible! The chicago level was the worst. The Enemy would spend turn after turn moving the exact same units around with 100 health. And never fire a shot at me!
Nevertheless, I'm still playing. I think multiplayer would be really fun.
The graphics are pretty and all, but this is just a remix of Uniwar in my eyes.
For the record, I thought Reign of Swords was a better turn-based strategy, and of course Civilization rules the genre.
The jrpg-style story is pretty frustrating - I don't feel like tapping through 40 lines of dialog every time I want to play a level. As the reviewer stated, far too much manual attention is required for mundane tasks.
The killer, though, is Mexico City. After 50 rounds of stalemate over the ludicrous bottleneck map, I jus got boooooored.
I've deleted the game, and don't plan to buy from these guys again.