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Push & Pop - App Store Analysis

Details

Slide, Push, Pop, Repeat. Enjoy the endless fun with cubes and puzzles!

Short and sweet summary of the game to get you interested.

Push & Pop is an challenging arcade puzzle game. 

A classic grammar mistake which showcases the lack of proof-reading; “an challenging” should be changed to “a challenging”, this only comfort here is that the game itself doesn’t include many written words at all and therefore the incorrect grammar doesn’t affect gameplay. 

Slide to move, Push the cube, and Pop to score! 

A simple explanation of gameplay that also shows where the games name came from.

Playing with cubes moving under cold lights, along with powerful synthwave music.

A weirdly worded sentence but still accurate and gets it point across.

Let’s get bath in this mysterious puzzle maze!

Okay, okay... I just don’t even know what’s happening here. What does this even mean? I can’t even figure out what they were trying to say. How did someone not realise this? I understand a couple of grammatical errors but this! Did no one proofread this, like a child could point this out?

Reviews

The reviews on this game are mostly positive, it currently has a 4-star average and over 50% of its reviews are 5 stars. That being said it has received a few 1-star ratings. 

After reading the written reviews, the general consensus is that it’s fun and addictive. A few people comment on the “great graphics” and the “hauntingly beautiful song”. Although a common theme is people taking off stars because there are too many ads, in most cases, these people ask for an option to pay for no ads.

By far my favourite negative comment is this “Don’t play this game the character doesn’t love properly and the game is so slow.” This 1-star review is almost as much of a mess as “let’s get bath”, although in this case, the end of the sentence does actually make sense. 

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Push & Pop - Rocky Hong

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Push & Pop - Rocky Hong

A stylised arcade puzzle game with Tetris influences, this app is great if you’re only looking to beat a high score over and over.

Gameplay

Beginning with a wordless but clear tutorial, that can be accessed at any time from the settings button, this app quickly sends you out on your own. Honestly, I had to play this game more than usual just because I couldn’t figure out the specific mechanics and point system.

You play as two white blocks stacked on top of each other, the top one bearing a simple face, in a 5x5 square. The aim is to achieve as high a score as possible, there are no collectables or upgrades. The way you earn points is either by them randomly dropping on the square or by matching 5 blocks in a row, which will replace the blocks with points. You have to use your character to move the blocks, which is done by swiping in the direction you want to move, your character will move until it either reaches the edge of the square or pushes blocks as far as possible, nothing can fall out of the square. After every move either a block or point will be randomly placed in the square and you can see which it will be by an indicator below your score. 

Occasionally a special block will appear which cannot be moved, but if you can match it in a 5 it will give you a lot of points and remove some surrounding blocks. As the game continues you will also level up, initially I thought you had to hit certain point thresholds, but that was wrong... now I have no idea, which puts points into every available space. 

The game is over when you become completely surrounded by blocks and can no longer move. You can revive once by watching a video which will automatically play after you die again. 

Spending Options

$2.99 for 1 free revive

Music

The music is “powerful synthwave music” (app store) which either cycles through a series of short songs or is just one long song. For the time that I played it didn’t become repetitive and is, therefore, a decent length. It also matches perfectly with the art style to create a futuristic arcade feel.

Art

The art style of this game is simple and geometric, it uses contrasting light and dark colours which is interesting and pleasing to look at without being too distracting from the game. The colour scheme begins as pink and black, each time you level up the colour changes (black is there consistently) after pink it goes to orange, then green and then purple. Furthermore, each time you hit a multiple of 100 points a new colour will be added, so after hitting 100 points the colour scheme will be black and two other colours. 

My Thoughts

The art style combined with the music is by far the greatest parts of this game. While it is intuitive and fun to play it lacks the amount of content I need in a game to keep me invested. As previously mentioned there are no collectables, unlockables or upgrades. All there is is a high score to beat. My only other problem with this game is the spending options, $2.99 for 1 free revive is not worth it in any way, so I’d suggest only purchasing that purely to support the game. 

I will not be keeping this game on my phone, only a game worth checking out if it sounds interesting to you.

Other Noteworthy Things

No internet required

Only words included in the game are the title; therefore language is redundant. 

Compatible with iPhone, iPad and iPod touch - iOS 7.0 or later

Rated 4+

Other Games by the Developer

Beat Stomper - a $2.99 infinite jumper

Magnetized - a $1.49 abstract physics puzzle game

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Smashy Duo - App Store Analysis

Details

Smashy Duo is an unique fast-paced arcade action game where you control 2 Heroes to hit as many monsters before one of them was knocked off from the stage.

This is a nice, quick description of the game but it also showcases a lack of grammar and proof reading. Firstly ‘an unique’ should be ‘a unique,’ with the comma after unique and secondly, they change from present tense to past tense with “was knocked off”; therefore it should be changed to “is knocked off”. 

Smashy Duo features a simple tap control where anyone can easily pick up and play without going through complex tutorials.

More than 50 Heroes to be unlocked where everyone has their own unique appearance and sound effect.

Now, this part definitely plays with the truth. While technically everything it says is correct what it doesn't specify is that each hero comes with a pair and they are always unlocked together. This means that while there are 60 total heroes to unlock you will always unlock two at a time. 

Additionally, Smashy Duo includes 5 unique Power-Ups to enhance the excitement that lies in every single match that you play.

Be warned that this could be one of the most addictive games of all time.

And I'm sure for some people it is.

Feature Highlights:

- Fast-paced, action-packed, unique, and challenging gameplay experience

Personally, I would argue that the gameplay is not challenging after all the speed will gradually increase but it does cap at a certain point which after a while doesn't feel too fast.

- Intuitive and simplest tap control

- 60 Heroes to be unlocked

- 5 upgradable Power-Ups

- Different sets of Monsters and Stages to be unlocked

- Stunning soundtrack and effect

I'm not sure the word stunning can accurately apply, the soundtrack and effects do their job, but they can feel very repetitive.

- Global Leaderboards

- Facebook friends' Leaderboard integration

- Game Center Achievements

It's been a while since I last noticed Game Center Achievements but they're popping up more often recently. This is confusing because the Game Center was removed over a year ago. Therefore these achievements are inaccessible and obsolete... at least for me anyway. 

Reviews

With more 5 star reviews than the others combined, it's apparent how good and loved this app is. Also, it does not have a single 1 star or 2-star rating in the 69 it has received. 

After reading through the 14 written reviews available, the general consensus is that the game is simple, addictive, easy, fun and ranges from good to amazing.

While most of the reviews are short and to the point, some more substantial points were that it has "cute character design", "great graphics" and it's "great for passing time". The only negative comment I found was "I swear I've heard that song at the start before", honestly I wouldn't be surprised if it sounds familiar since it's a great throwback to arcade game music. 

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Smashy Duo - Big Frost Games

If you’ve been hanging around the iOS app store over the past year, you’ll have noticed a countless number of Crossy Road duplicates. This game is a love letter to all those who failed. 

Smashy Duo does not hide its inspiration, now you could tell me that the similarities in names is a coincidence, but I will not believe you. However, to my pleasant surprise, this game uses inspiration to create something that feels unique and fun to play. 

Gameplay

Smashy Duo is a “fast-paced arcade action game” (app store description) where you play as two heroes in a tennis like rally against the heads of monsters. The only skill required is being able to tap the hero who is receiving the ball at the correct time so that they hit it, there is no controls or aim. In the center a scoreboard is keeping track of how many monsters you hit, you can only hit one monster at a time unless you receive a power up; this happens by hitting a monster that will randomly spawn with a special appearance (for example by hitting a monster engulfed in flames you will trigger the Inferno power-up). Over time you charge up a multiplier bar which when full will increase how many points you receive for each monster hit for a short duration. The game ends when a hero misses the ball and gets knocked over. 

You can revive yourself once by either watching an ad or spending 50 coins. Also every couple of round an ad will be shown, this can be either an image or a video.

Afterwards, your score is converted into keys which are used to unlock a chest. There is only one chest available at a time, and their cost in keys gradually increases with each new one. The chests will either unlock new monsters, stages (these are purely cosmetic) and power-ups or they will give you coins. Coins are the currency of the game, they are used to upgrade your power-ups and rescue new heroes from the evil slot machine (this costs 100 coins). My advice is to spend your coins on power-ups first as you can receive heroes you already have and the power-ups will help you achieve a higher score in the game. While you do earn coins while playing it’s a minimal amount. Therefore the primary source of coins is chests or free gifts. Free gifts will give you a large amount of coins, most often being 100, but each time you receive one the time before the next will increase. For example, if you get a free gift after 3 minutes the next one will take 6 minutes, so far I haven’t encountered the number resetting or hitting a cap, so we’ll assume that it continuously increases. Lastly, you can also earn coins by completing the daily challenge, this usually only takes a couple rounds to complete depending on how long each round lasts.

Another feature of the game is the leaderboard. Here you can compare your highest score to everyone in the world or just your facebook friends either weekly or all-time, you can also check up the weekly or all-time top 100. Sadly this feature is only accessible after a round ends. 

Spending Options

$4.49 to remove ads - plus x2 all coins earned

$1.49 for 500 coins

$7.99 for 3000 coins

$14.99 for 8000 coins

Music

The music and sound effects of Smashy Duo are nothing special but that being said they fit the game and do their job. The background music is a short loop with a fast beat which appears to change depending on what monster/stage is being used. 

Each set of heroes has their own sound effect. 

The sound is credited to Ranga Illeperuma.

Art

The cartoon art style is very crisp and clear with the use of bright colours that compliments the arcade nature of the game. 

Also luckily it’s not pixels... which is a common theme in Crossy Road inspired games. 

Art credited to Chong Siong.

My Thoughts

The second I saw this game I knew it was inspired by Crossy Road due to its name, that leads me to my first point; the name Smashy Duo is absolutely horrendous, and I’m surprised no one could come up with something better. All it reminds me of is those knock-off Halloween costumes where they just describe the outfit in two or three words. 

While the gameplay is very intuitive, I think this game needs more of a tutorial just for the reason that it took me around 20 minutes to find out that you could actually upgrade your power-ups! After discovering this, I was left pleasantly surprised by the amount of content as I was initially worried about the lack of it and I thought it might’ve been an easy game to “complete” (get to a point in which coins were useless). I’m also a big fan of how the game gives you less “handouts” the more you play which is an increase in difficulty. 

Money wise this game impresses me. Obviously, it needs to show an ad every now and then due to it being a free game and it being a free game that isn’t pay to win! Yes, you can buy coins to upgrade your power-ups faster, but in the end, you won’t get a very high score unless you’ve actually good some skill. 

As my last point, I would like to introduce you to the greatest part of this game... the heroes. 

Yes, that’s right, to avoid copyright issues they have given their heroes the best names ever. While Letit & Go definitely are the best examples some other gems are; the martial art twins Bruce & Lee, colourful plumbers Mushroom & Bros, beach ready girls Bae & Watch, witch and wizard Gonegal & Dumberdoll and Father & Son from a galaxy far far away.

I will be keeping this game on my phone, and therefore would definitely recommend. 

Other Noteworthy Things

No internet required

Available in English, Chinese (Hong Kong), Simplified Chinese & Traditional Chinese.

Compatible with iPhone, iPad and iPod Touch - iOS 8.0 or later

Rated 4+

Other Games by the Developer

Circuroid - a free space shooter game