Review for Liqua Pop (iPhone, iPod Touch)

Casual gaming has long been the preserve of small independent software studios, turning a pleasant profit for some with their low development costs, and a sheer fortune for others. Whilst based firmly in the land of browser based Flash games and downloadable PC fodder for so many years, the introduction of the iPhone soon saw them become a hit in the AppStore, once everyone was bored of fart apps anyway.

Continuing its attempts to dominate the iPhone games market, EA Mobile has added one or two of its own casual titles to the fray, with Liqua Pop being their latest attempt to get in on the Bejewelled style puzzle action genre. Coming up with an idea for a casual puzzle game is never as easy as it looks, hence why many try to ape existing products, never proving as successful as the original.

But by gum EA are certainly not copying the successful nuances that form the likes of Angry Birds, Tetris, Cover Orange, the aforementioned Bejewelled and Peggle. Liqua Pop is an original idea given some very nice polish, the question is can it hold your attention long enough to become that 59p game that conquers the AppStore like only a chosen few before it?

Gameplay

Things start very simply, and don't get much complicated from there on in. A good casual game needs easy to grasp rules, controls anyone with the fattest fingers can master, and something to keep you coming back for more. Liqua Pop involves making bubbles of liquid pop so that a frog can climb a blade of grass to reach a drop of water. Or something like that anyway, I'm not entirely clear exactly what, even after playing it a bit.


To fulfil the level requirements, which is making the frog progress bar reach 100%, you have to amalgamate at least four bubbles of the same colour so they reach a size where they can pop. At that point a sort of detonation countdown begins which you can reset by double tapping them.

The reason to do this is combo points, with the more you pop at any one time, the more combos you get and the bigger your score. You can also manually burst them at anytime by shaking your phone, not overly harshly either, which is just as well if you suffer from RSI like what I does.
Once the screen is full of unpopped bubbles, a red warning border of impending doom begins to flash madly, accompanied by some warning sound effects. If you don't clear some space very quickly, that's it, game over. Yes, it's a sort of Tetris mechanic, hey we didn't say every part of this game wasn't original.


To add variety, some of the bubbles have ladybirds (or bugs, you decide according to your nationality) inside which when popped cause a number of effects. Some blow up surrounding bubbles, others turn adjacent bubbles to the same colour, and further down the road are nasty ones which make bubbles black. Black bubbles can only be removed by exploding other bubbles next to them, getting in the way and filling the screen real estate up making things harder.

Whilst the game can only be played in portrait, you can influence the fall of bubbles using the accelerometer, which is useful if some start stacking on each others heads a bit too much and need a little encouragement.

Conclusion

The graphics and sound are very nice, no music which is a welcome change, just lots of nice rain forest type bird and insect song. The bubbles themselves are really nicely done, very pretty on the Retina display and extremely smooth. Presentation is very consistent across the whole game, this is a very polished release, as you'd expect from an EA title.

That said things aren't perfect, it can be difficult during frantic times trying to grab and drag the right bubble onto others. With your finger covering small bubbles you often don't even notice until the supposedly identical colour you took them to doesn't combine into a bigger one, by which time it's game over.


The difficulty curve is quite well done, early levels are very easy, and you'll get past a fair few before any real challenge shows itself.

But here is the problem, we have a beautifully presented little game, that just isn't that fun to play. It's very pretty, it sounds nice, it's not that hard to control (small niggle above aside), but for me at least there was none of the compulsion to play it. That magic must have one more go time sink which Bejewelled has, is alas, missing.


Pros

• Very pretty dynamic graphics
• Atmospheric sound
• Level based continue option
• Supports Retina display
• Supports instant switching (multi-tasking)

Cons

• Hard to drag the intended bubble at times
• Limited long term appeal