UPDATE: Ethan sent me a copy of the full game and yes, the bugs I mentioned are now gone with v1.1.2. Check for updates within your device via the App Store application or from within iTunes itself. If you haven’t moved to the full game, follow the links in this post to do so, now. And that’s an order, soldier! Full review follows.
Enter iShoot and iShoot Lite, tank battle games by Ethan Nicolas. Both games are currently on the helm of the App Store’s Top Free and Top Paid lists. If my memory serves me well (UPDATE: I was right, check out this post over at O’Reilly and this post over at Touch Arcade), this is the first time that an app managed to stay on top of both lists. I guess it’s not an easy feat, but Ethan Nicholas did it.
I downloaded a copy of iShoot Lite to find out what the game is all about, and why people are buying this game in truckloads. I can safely say that the full game is well worth the entry fee of $2.99.
iShoot’s premise is simple. Load up your tank with whatever weapon your money can get you and then proceed to destroy the smithereens out of the competition. You start the game by giving your tank a name, color and style. Then, select the number of opponents, how many rounds to play and how smart the computer’s AI should be. You can enter more than one human player to start a hot-seat multiplayer game.
Next, load up some weapons using the $15,000 starting credit that you receive. Choose from a variety of weapons like mortars, missiles and nukes. Feel free to keep the $15,000 and buy nothing if you feel adventurous.
Players start shooting each other once the round begins. To add some insult to injury, each computer AI tank were given names from famous movies like Star Wars and Terminator. I have personally battled Darth Tank and Terminator during my play. Darth Tank thinks like Darth Vader, while the Terminator tank speaks like Arnie.
Simply touch the screen to set your tank’s aim. Your tank’s will point its barrel directly at your finger’s tips. Just like tanks in real life, you are allowed to aim anywhere between horizontal and straight up. You won’t be able to aim any lower than your horizontal line. Once you have your aim set, press and hold the little Fire button. A bar will appear to indicate the strength of your shot. Release the button to shoot and hope that it hits. Your shots are affected by wind direction and strength.
The Lite version offers six out of the twenty-five available weapons and no photorealistic landscapes. One of the best features, which is the ability to drive your tank away when you are cornered, is also absent. Despite the shortcomings, the lite version of the game offers an unlimited variety of destruction thru randomly-generated landscapes.
I have one gripe with the game though. Your tank gets blocked from view if it happens to fall near the menu bar at the bottom, which is quite annoying. Perhaps the menu and buttons here can be shifted towards the sides of the game, similar to Cannon Challenge.
Rating: 4.5/5.0 Taps
iShoot – $2.99
iShoot Lite – FREE
