Darkside™ review (iOS / Universal)
June 26, 2012♫ “I’ll see you on the dark side of the moon”
10 word description: Space / sci-fi themed shooter. Campaign, Endless & Survival. Game Center.
10 word review: Essential eyeball-melting fun. It’s time to embrace the Darkside™.
You will like this if you enjoy: Dual-stick shooters. Any kind of shooters. Asteroids. Space Miner. More phenomenal full-screen exploding chaos than you could possibly imagine.
The good news: Look at the screenshots! The graphics, lighting and effects are incredible. The game runs well on a 1st gen iPad – I am so happy about this! Arcade mode is free. Controls are fine in their default mode but can be customised. Gameplay is fun, fast and full of beautiful looking power-up and destruction effects.
Boom. Yes, this is what it’s all about
The bad news: It should be in monochrome and all move a lot slower. Trust me, some human vacuum will probably post something along those lines in an iTunes review. That’s the downside of having an initially free download. I’ve got one tiny, insignificant gripe that I have been assured will be looked into … I like playing with the controls faded right out, but this makes the smart-bomb button tricky to locate.
Grabbing a blue points bonus
Arcadelife verdict: I can only tell you the truth; it’s all I have left: this game is absolutely awesome. Arcade mode is free; that’s a fantastic game mode all by itself. To unlock the full game – Campaign and Survival modes – it’s a single one-off IAP of 69p/99c.
To add some kind of perspective, I’ve been playing this game and subconsciously comparing the effects with the chaotic and beautiful Diablo 3 fights I’ve been seeing recently. Darkside™ just about wins, and some of those D3 Wizard spells are very pretty!
Essentially, what you need to do is what I did last week (yay for promo codes!): Get the free arcade mode. Play it for a few minutes. Shove your eyes back into your head. Buy the full game.
Arcadelife rating
Visuals – 10/10
Audio – 10/10
Controls – 9/10
Content – 9.5/10
Fun – 9/10
Final rating – 95/100
Rating categories explained here.
Version reviewed by Arcadelife is 1.0
Darkside iOS website link
