Harbor Master - Review

Touch-screen gaming has its advantages and disadvantages. We've all played games like Earthworm Jim that endeavour to replicate traditional console controls on the touch screen with express success. Just edifice a game effectually the advantages of a touch screen can produce wonderful results and fifty-fifty new genres. Such was the case with Firemint's Flight Control – the beginning line drawing game. It played like zero else and sold similar crazy on numerous platforms, including Windows Telephone. Every good idea can be improved upon, as developer Imangi shows with Harbor Main. Its nautical theme and new mechanics will keep Flight Command fans and new players alike enthralled for quite some time.

Chart a class past the break for our total review.

Master and Commander

Harbor Master places the player in control of a harbor's shipping traffic. Each level consists of an island or declension with 1 or more docks. Cargo boats enter the screen from random directions.  It's up to the player to directly them to port while preventing collisions. To practice this, tap on whatsoever gunkhole and draw a path for it to accept. Unlike Flight Control, ships don't disappear after they've docked. You lot'll need to straight them safely off-screen while managing oncoming traffic. All sorts of circles, back and along scratches, and wiggly lines volition ensue.

Country ho!

Harbor Master also differs from Flight Control in that boats tin can't travel over land. Thus the shape of each map actually changes the manner it plays compared to other maps. Some map layouts only permit ships to enter and leave the screen from a few different places, while others like Cyclone Island are far more open. Speaking of country, ships mercifully don't crash when they bear on information technology. They bounciness safely away; it'south other ships and hazards that players need to worry near. One wreck results in a game over.

It's non the size that counts

Harbor Main's ships come in four sizes and behave from i to four cargo units a piece. Larger, slower ships often pose a threat because they take so long to safely attain port and leave the screen, but at least they evangelize the almost cargo. Good players will learn to plot a path to port for a large ship so have a small, fast ship slip in and out of the same dock before the big i arrives.

Multitude of Maps

Harbor Master includes seven different maps – 1 more than Flight Control. Besides their unique state configurations, several maps have their own hazards and weather condition that add dearest diverseness.

• Angling Bay: The standard level has ii docks on a coast at the summit of the screen.
• Cyclone Island: An artificial island with iii ports rests at the middle of the map. Cyclones randomly announced in the h2o, sending whatever ships they touch in random directions. Despite the danger of these twisters, many people notice Cyclone Island to be the easiest map due to its wide open up layout.
• Sturgeon Creek: A river port with two docks on each side of the river. This is the first map to feature multiple colors of cargo: purple and yellow.
• Cannon Embankment: Pirates! This map comes with three docks on one side of the screen and a single cannon on the other. Pirate submarines attack incoming boats, stealing their cargo or sinking them, which ends the game. Fight back by sinking the pirates with the cannon. What should be one of the most fun maps is semi-ruined by an extremely annoying Accomplishment. More on that in a bit.
• Smugglers' Reef: Ships here can conduct two different colors of cargo, so they'll need to terminate off at both types of ports before leaving the screen. Not easy.
• Monster Cove: Tentacled sea monsters randomly appear inside this map'southward three docks, scaring off or capturing ships. Tap them rapidly to scare them away.
• Cargo City: The about complex map, Cargo Metropolis has a whopping six ports and three different colors of cargo. Stop by for a challenge.

Graphics and sound

Like Flying Control, Harbor Chief features a very unproblematic fine art fashion rather than flashy graphics. It fits the game's like shooting fish in a barrel-to-learn nature. But the Windows Phone version of Harbor Master looks a bit rougher during game play cheers to the actual lines that players depict. Here lines come out angular instead of smoothen, though it doesn't really affect game play.

My other complaint is the water: it'south completely stationary. Non-blithe h2o just doesn't look correct to me. If Imangi ever releases a sequel, some subtle waves or glistening effects would be welcomed.

Harbor Master may look a footling worse than Flying Control, but it sounds much better. Both games only play a unmarried song during gameplay, but Harbor Master's tropical tune is tricky rather than annoying. That'southward a win. More musical diverseness however would have been squeamish though.

Achievements

In score-based games with no definite endings, Achievements serve the important role of giving players goals to aim for. Harbor Principal has a handful of creative Achievements that raise the experience, like Speed Demon, awarded for scoring 100 points on Fast Forward. I besides enjoyed going later on Perfectionist, which requires the actor to acquire 50 cargo without receiving whatever warnings (allowing ships to get too close to each other). Well-nigh of u.s.a. are unlikely to get those on the beginning try, merely they'll come with a footling practice and the proper map choice (Cyclone Island).

On the opposite end of the fun spectrum lies the Pacifist Achievement. It involves delivering fifty cargo units on the Cannon Beach map without sinking any pirate ships. The stage soon swarms with dual pirate ships that must be avoided at all costs. But tedious moving larger ships can't outrun them, so they're goners unless you manage to distract the pirates with a smaller ship. Pirates and big ships often spawn adjacent to each other with no way for the player to escape unscathed (outside of using the cannon and failing the Achievement run). The random and unfair nature of this Accomplishment means information technology can accept hours of retries to earn.

As gamers work on the tougher Achievements, they'll besides make progress towards the big one: Harbor Master. Flight Control had an Achievement for earning 10,000 lifetime points, but Harbor Master ups the ante to a whopping 50,000. Sure, information technology rewards true (and perhaps unhealthy) Harbor Chief dedication, but a smaller number would have been far more than merciful.

Overall Impression

Harbor Primary's Achievements may ask for crazy amounts of players' fourth dimension, but at least they're non incommunicable like Doodle Jump's. Most importantly, this game is just incredibly addictive. Even when you get a game over, it always feels like you could do better on your next try. Harbor Master builds on the solid foundations of its aerial inspiration past calculation a handful of unique game play mechanics and more varied stages. This is easily the best line-drawing game on Windows Phone and an impressive debut from Imangi.

Harbor Master costs $2.99 and has a free trial. Pick it up hither (Zune link) on the Marketplace.

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Source: https://www.windowscentral.com/harbor-master-review

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