FlamingIgloo Is Too Flaming For My Tastes

Posted by Bogdan Lazar

FlamingIgloo iPad Game Review.

FlamingIgloo puts a spin on the classic tower defense games, whereby you’re not bent on killing endless waves of attackers, but rather your only task is to keep your “tower” together while one attacker shoots flaming balls of fire towards it. Sound good? It really does and I was wicked excited to give it a go, but got really down when I saw the insanely lengthy tutorial and even more so when playing the first level. Why? Read on before judging, I do know the game has received high-praise on the AppStore from others.

How to play FlamingIgloo

As noted before, your only task in this iOS game is to keep your igloo from burning down while a nearby ship shoots at it and never misses. The ship will do two kinds of damage to your igloo and its surroundings. It can either out a whole through your igloo, crack the ice beneath it or start a fire. While you can’t prevent this from happening, there are two different controls for fixing the damage taken.

Cracks in the ice and holes in the igloo can be fixed with blocks of ice. If your roof is on fire, you need to shoot snow balls at the fire to put it out before the entire thing goes up in flames. So how do you do that?

It sounds insanely simple. Swipe and flick either blocks of ice or snowballs towards the igloo. But the accuracy is terrible. Of course, this may very well be my own accuracy, but I tend to think that completing Angry Birds and now drawing close to finishing Dude Perfect, I have developed a steady hand.

The issue with throwing stuff at the igloo to fix it is that you don’t know how far it is from your throwing location, so you don’t know how hard to throw and how high to do it. And you don’t have time to find that out either. The ship never misses! Your igloo will be on fire before you even get close to aiming right.

It doesn’t get more complex than this

I’ve said in the beginning that this game has a rather lengthy tutorial. The reason for this is that you have a huge number of supporting units and special magical power-ups to help you. The tutorial has descriptions for every one, making FlamingIgloo very well documented. But I don’t think that with great documentation comes a great game.

Here are what some of your friends can help you with. Boris the dog will bark to warn you about impending destruction. Rudy the reindeer blocks harpoons aimed at the igloo. Fiona the squirrel will fill a moat crack around the igloo when it’s most needed. And these are just a few examples. When you go in-game, you’ll have to remember all these things and use them when they’re available.

Between that and trying to get your accuracy just right, you’ll have a hard time actually enjoying FlamingIgloo.

From the game’s description, I was expecting a fun game with great graphics that’s relaxing to play and with a slow learning curve. While I was not disappointed in the amazing graphics, for me, FlamingIgloo proved how a nice concept can turn into something so complex it can turn off even the most enthusiastic players like myself.

I wish the game didn’t even have that lengthy tutorial. I wish the game didn’t tell me from the start I’d have dozens of units and magical powerups. Perhaps a more progressive approach to introducing units and powerups as the player progresses with in-game simple explanations would have been more suited.

For my likings, I can’t recommend FlamingIgloo. It’s not just that I hate losing, which I did constantly in FlamingIgloo, but I hate losing because I can’t control and keep up with the game.

Screenshots