Retro Style: ‘iPlutoid’ and ‘Blastination’

Here are a couple of retro-inspired games which may be of interest to some of our readers.

iPlutoid

Lazrhog Games claims to have created a “new genre” of 3D shooter with Plutoid and they may be right. Readers may remember Lazrhog as one of the early jailbreak developers who originally ported Noiz2sa to the iPhone.

iPlutoid is an arcade shooter where you pilot a ship over a small planet while saving humans from the invading aliens. The game kind of feels like a 3D take on the 80’s classic Defender. The game is set up as a old-school arcade shooter which means you get 3 lives, start at level 1, and see how long you can survive the waves of alien invaders. The graphics adopt a similar primitive but effective polygonal style.

The game controls involve the use of the accelerometer to control the ship’s left/right and up/down motion. The ship is restricted in vertical movement, preventing you from either crashing or flying too high. The games controls work well and the game plays smoothly, but the restricted 3D space that you are allowed to fly in can cause some difficulties in figuring out proper aiming and navigation. We suspect iPlutoid will primarily appeal to those who love old-school arcade action.

App Store Link: iPlutoid, {content}.99

Blastination

Blastination is the first iPhone game from Bithoard games. Their game is a fast action deflection game with a wonderful art style complete with particle effects. The gameplay itself requires you to draw lines to deflect the bouncing ball to collect all the objects for each level. You must complete each level within a given time period in order to succeed.

This draw-a-line deflection mechanic has been used in other games such as Reflexion [App Store] and Creepytown [App Store]. So, if you’re a fan of this sort of gameplay mechanic, Blastination is nice fast-paced variant of the genre.

App Store Link: Blastination, {content}.99