Just shy of a year ago developer Mike Pawlowski, aka Hamster On Coke Games, released a tangram-style puzzler called Zenge ($1.99) to the App Store. It put a twist on the typical formula of putting various slabs together to form a whole shape by having those slabs on set tracks which forced you to think about the order and orientation you needed to place the pieces in. Once you pieced the puzzles together they created these gorgeous illustrations which painted a cohesive story, which is kind of rare for a puzzle game. We liked Zenge a lot in our review, and now Pawlowski is back at it again with a new game that takes a sort of similar approach to its design. The game is called Art Of Destruction, and it’s one of those physics puzzlers where you’re tasked with using various mechanics to knock down a set of blocks. Kind of a 3D Angry Birds if you will. The difference here is that, similar to Zenge, Art Of Destruction wants you to enjoy your surroundings in addition to just solving the puzzle. In this case, the puzzles explode in a spectacular display of voxels and neat lighting effects, which is as good a reward as any for solving a puzzle if you ask me. Check it out.
Like Zenge, there’s something, well, zen about destroying the levels in Art Of Destruction. But also like Zenge, these puzzles are no pushover. There are some tricky-looking setups in the trailer above and you’ll have to utilize different abilities like “bombs, sphere spawners, force fields, and other goodies" in order to be successful. Also, Pawlowski wants this to be more of a relaxing experience, again much like Zenge, so there’s actually a time-rewinding feature built in so that in case you make a mistake you won’t need to start completely over. Expect about an hour’s worth of play from Art Of Destruction, so short and sweet, and look for it to arrive sometime in April or May at a price of just 99¢.
