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Review
Astro
Quest:
Unlicensed Surgery
| Developer: |
MagiXoft |
| Publisher: |
MagiXoft |
| Genre: |
Adventure |
| Release
Date: |
2005 |
| Platform: |
Nokia
N-Gage, 7650, 3650, 6600…
And most Symbian Series60 devices
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Review
by Alexander Michalitsianos
July 21, 2005 |
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Buy this game at

Trade
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So we are back again with yet another game for our mobile phones
by Magixoft. This one though is quite more promising than the previous
one I had the chance to encounter so I must say I am patiently waiting
for their next release!
Story – Atmosphere
This game is set in the not so near future. You are Robert Stark, an insignificant
pilot of a small space lorry that is about to dock to an orbital station
after a routine flight.
You walk around a bit checking the perimeter but after a while something
happens and evething turns black. You wake up and you have been transformed
into a
cyborg!
Something must have happened though because you wake up before they implant
a chip on your brain to make you obidient. Convenient, eh? Now as a cyborg
you have to escape from were they hold you and find who and why did this
to you, and of course pay them back the favor. Not a very new idea but
it is nicely
implemented.
The atmosphere is quite nice and suits a sci-fi adventure. You really
get the feeling that you are in space since you have to wear protective
suits when in vacum space and stuff like that. Another cool idea
is a jukebox in the bar that you can use in order to dance. Our friend
Robert is quite the Travolta you know! Also, your actions can bring
bad results if you are not careful. So save quite often because you
never know when you may get killed.
Story: B -
Atmosphere: B+
Graphics – Sound
The graphics are as usual
the strongest piece in a Magixoft game. All areas are different
from each other and have numerous
nice shadings and coloring.
I was happily amazed watching my reflection on a mirror when I was walking
by! The spaceship is neatly drawn and when you get a look on the platform
from space, it’s a rare beauty. Robert, on the other
hand, may seem nicely drawn in the beginning but when turned
into a cyborg he is just a white thing
going around. I mean a cyborg is supposed to look cooler than a ghost!
In the music part, yet again I saw the indifference of
the company. Very few sporadic
sounds here and there and the quality of them is really low, especially
considering the game is played on phones that use polyphonic
systems and can offer quite
the quality of sound.
Graphics: B+
Sound: D+
Gameplay – Compatibility
In this game Magixoft
used yet again the same gameplay system as in their previous game,
Magic Quest 2. Unfortunately they didn’t
fix any of the problems so you will encounter the same annoying character
movement. When you press an arrow in order to go somewhere, you move
and won’t ever stop unless you press the arrow again. This
gets extremely frustrating when you are forced to pixel hunt and
you character always gets away from the point you want to stop her.
Also, when pixel hunting, you tend to easily miss the target and
get stuck. Anyway, like before, you control all movements with the
arrows of the phone. When you want to interact with something, you
press the main centric button which opens a cross menu with 5 options.
Up is “Look”, left is “Talk”, down is “Use”,
right is “Item Use” and in the center is the inventory.
The save/load system has also remained the same but the 10 spots
for save and the absolutely absent time for loading make me believe
it was a good choice to keep it like this.
One thing I need to mention at this point. The game is small. Really
small. I finished it in less than two hours. I believe that even
a complete amateur could finish it in 8 hours. And since there is
not much of a replay value, I would seriously think twice before
purchasing this game. I will not comment this time on the compatibility
of the game. As usual, it only works with very few of the phones
out in the market. I want to scream to the people in Magixoft that
I have a Sharp phone, my best friend a Sony, another a Nec, another
an LG. We are also people so please, please try to make games for
everyone and not only for the 10% of the market. So before buying
and downloading the game, be EXTRA sure this works on your phone!
Gameplay: B -
Compatibility: D
Conclusion
Magixoft made yet again
the same mistakes of the past. I seriously hope the will take gamers
comments seriously since, as evidenced
on their forums, many people have the same thoughts like myself.
Nevertheless, this is quite an improvement. The graphics are much
nicer and the story is interestingly built. Overally I feel this
is a game that can offer a few interesting hours, but that’s
all about it.
(Note: This game was reviewed and rated as a mobile phone game and
not as a pc one. Therefor the standards used are different.)
Final Grade: C+
(find out more about our
grading system)
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