Game Review: Parachute Panic

Parachute Panic is another simple addicting game where you have to help parachute stick figures land on a boat in the ocean.

Overall Score: 4/5

The gameplay can be addicting, the presentation (especially the music) is incredible, and the lasting value is actually pretty good.

Gameplay: 4/5

The game’s premise is simple: A number of people parachuting will jump out of a plane at the top of the screen, and you have to help them land on a boat at the bottom of the screen. You control the game by tapping on the characters to open their chutes and swiping across the characters to create wind gusts in order to guide their direction and speed. You also have to defend them from enemies like UFO’s and helicopters. The controls work perfectly. There are two difficulties in the game, Easy and Medium, and the entire goal is to get as high of a score as possible. The inclusion of enemies like the aforementioned helicopters and UFO’s, and also thunderstorm clouds, help to make the gameplay interesting and challenging. It’s fun, but not extremely impressive, since that’s all there is to the gameplay.

Presentation: 5/5

The visual design of this game (hand sketched) is wonderful and looks great on our phones. The music and sound effects in the game are especially brilliant. The serenity of the simple guitar strums and gentle bass relax you while you are playing. Also, the music that plays in the menu screen is fairly interesting and draws you in.

Lasting Value: 4/5

Since the gameplay boils down to competing for a high score while doing the same things over and over again, the question is: Is this game addictive? Kind of. The variation of elements you have to avoid (lightning, UFO’s, helicopters) and extra points you can collect (collecting fish that jump out of the sky, etc) make it pretty interesting to replay. What brings the lasting value up is (in addition to the online leaderboards) the achievements and the lives system they have. The achievements encourage you to make a parachutist hang in the air for 20 seconds before landing, die in every way possible, and other interesting things that add to the fun. And the lives system – You start the game with five lives, but as you get higher and higher scores, you unlock more lives, so that you will start each game with six or seven, or up to ten lives. This really encourages you to replay the game.

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Title: Parachute Panic
Price: $2.99
Publisher: Microsoft Game Studios