Peaceful, but difficult. Two words I thought I would never use together to describe a game, but for Tea Boy Games‘ Pendulum, they describe it perfectly.
The game, as the name suggests, involves a pendulum which slowly drops down the screen each time you play a level. Clicking either side of the screen will cause the pendulum to swing in that direction. The more frantically you click on a side, the more the pendulum goes there.
Holding both sides of the screen at once will retract the pendulum up, almost like a yo-yo.
What makes the game difficult is that it’s a pendulum, so the more it goes one way, it will swing the opposite way just as much. At times this can make Pendulum very frustrating, but if the game didn’t have elements of difficulty it wouldn’t be as fun as it is. Despite the controls being difficult to master, they still feel like the perfect way to control the pendulum.
There are three chapters — each one with 30 different levels to complete — to play through, and so you must hit certain targets whilst avoiding obstacles to continue on. As you advance through the levels the game becomes steadily harder, with both the obstacles and targets able to move or turn invisible.
Each chapter has its own uncomplicated and unique design. The games graphics and enchanting music make it an almost peaceful experience, if it wasn’t for the difficulty of some levels, you could almost relax at points. But, because of the random placements of the level difficulties, this isn’t possible.
At times I tried to go back and play certain levels, but the only way to do this was by clicking through each level individually. I do wish there was a level selector in the menu’s. I also would have liked to see rating for completing levels in a certain time, or with a certain amount of taps. I feel this would have given the game a bit more or a replay-ability factor.
Despite these slight complaints, Pendulum is a great fun game which is perfect for pulling out on the train, or in the tea room at work, and for the low price of $0.99 is more than worth a download.
Article originally published on Pocketfullofapps.com
