Okay, I'll be the first to admit it.
I had a little bit of developer bias going through my head when I purchased this game.
Not only is Halfbrick's headquarters is based in my hometown, but Fish Out of Water falls
in to the "skill toss" genre of games - where you need to propel an object, or animal or...
something as far as you can.
This type of game is one of my all-time favorite time wasters.
Needless to say, I was excited.
Well, it's definitely got the Halfbrick level of polish.
No doubt about it, this game is gorgeous.
So it should stand to reason then, that Fish Out of Water would fit neatly in to Halfbrick's
immaculate library of fluid, responsive, addictive games.
There's only one minor problem.
There's not much of a game here.
Fish Out of Water is about flinging fish.
I'd like to say that it's a deep experience that provides seemingly endless hours of gameplay,
but that's simply not true.
After about an half an hour of playing, I'd attained close to the highest score possible.
You're tasked with flinging one of 6 sea creatures as far as you can.
As they travel along, their angle determines the amount of bounce they get from the water
- much like skimming stones across a pond.
When you come to a stop, your distance and number of skips is tallied.
This is repeated two more times to give you a grand total.
Your score is then judged by 5 crabs.
Each will give you a score out of 10.
The average of these scores is your final result.
Each of the crabs has a unique mood and judges accordingly.
Some judge favorably based on the number of skips, some for distance.
My personal favorite though has to be "Hard to please Harwood".
He's a cranky guy who generally scores fairly low on all but the most outstanding performances.
There's a little bit of strategy in finding the right balance of skips and distance - and
this is done by utilizing the unique talents of each fish.
Some, like the whale and puffer fish excel at bouncing across the surface of the water.
These guys tend to be more forgiving when the angle of decent is higher.
Other fish, like the red dart focus on speed and need to be thrown at a low angle to be
able to skim the surface.
If this guy in particular is thrown too high, he'll break straight through the water's surface
and sink to the bottom.
There's a subtelty to each species, but you'll pick these up in no time.
To mix things up a little, the weather changes on the hour.
Your fish perform differently depending on the weather conditions.
If it's raining heavily, your fish have a hard time maintaining momentum.
If it's cold, sometimes there'll be tiny icebergs that the fish can bounce off.
These weather conditions are synchronized around the world so it's fair for all players.
On that subject, players are able to form or join leagues.
These allow you to team up with your friends and compete for the highest score.
While you're playing the game you'll see the scores of other players from around the globe
appear in the top left of the screen.
It's a nice touch and gives you something to work towards.
Unfortunately, this high score system is the only positively reinforced method of progression.
Fish Out of Water does contain a levelling system, but this serves as nothing but an
intermittent way of awarding gems to the player.
All of the fish are unlocked from the start and there is no persistent upgrade path for
any of the game's mechanics.
This permenant stat system is the very thing that makes this type of game addictive, and
it's completely lacking here.
The aforementioned gems that are awarded allow the player to tweak the outcome of an individual
run.
This is done by matching head and tail pieces of varying colors.
Each color corresponds to the strengths of the fish of that color.
Red for speed, blue for skips, etc.
You can mix and match these gems to provide boosts of differing strength and function.
A pair of black gems, the rarest of them all, will provide you with a single fling of a
gemmed fish.
This guy splits in to three when it hits the surface of the water and will continue a great
distance.
Even in imperfect weather, this little guy can easily net the player a perfect 10.
When it's all said and done, Fish out of Water is okay.
It's immensely polished and looks amazing.
Unfortunately, Halfbrick have dropped the ball in the design department.
There's simply not enough game here for me to feel positive about my purchase.
In saying that, most mobile titles aren't at their best when they're first released.
Constant updates, and, especially in the case of Halfbrick, community engagement, help to
mould these titles in to the smash hits we see at the top of the App Store charts.
I'm happy to support Halfbrick by purchasing the game and stay hopeful that updates will
see the game improve.
For now though, I'm quite disappointed by Fish Out of Water.
Thanks for joining me for today's review.
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This has been Alex for Game Mob.
That's www.gamemob.com