Let Pixle's latest application be a lesson to developers out there looking at the Symbian platform and deciding what to do with their masterpiece. If you can get the basics working, if you can add in consistent and simple presentation, if you can create the feeling that everything in the application is meant to be there and works, then you can take the simplest ideas and make them work.
Let's back up a few steps. Pixle sent over an email to the AAS team asking if it was possible for us to do a review of the game, with the promising words that “it's a puzzle oriented game with some arcade elements that, we think, makes it a bit unique on the market”.
This cheesy pitch was their only black mark, to be honest. Not the email to us - frankly, we wish more developers would do that, because it's exactly what you should be doing – but pitching the game as being a bit unique. Because Fruitz, which is the game title in question, is YACOB... Yet Another Clone of Bejewelled. Call a spade a spade, you can find countless YACOB's in every App Store on the planet.
But now read that opening paragraph again, and you'll begin to see why I think Fruitz is a great application. Pixle have taken a well used concept and made a choice – do they tweak the game mechanics to make a slightly different game, or do they take the core game and polish it as much as possible to make it a joyous experience? They went with the latter, and they have managed it with obvious skill.
Fruitz looks gorgeous. The different game icons, represented by one of seven different fruits (each of a recognisable colour), are clear, well defined and are obviously what they represent. Captions in the menu, the hot-key buttons, the help screens and other interstitial screens are all clear. Time has been spent on these, they all have a consistent feel, and it makes for a good gaming experience.
It's also a snappy application, there's no feeling that your thinking is outpacing the code, everything animates smoothly and slides around with no dropped frames – the only issue seems to be the lack of sound. A few basic pops and whistles would not match the lush look of the game, but perhaps they need to get a solid sound engineer for the next version?
Does this break new boundaries of gaming? No. But not every game has to. Sometimes you just want a simple, well made cheese sandwhich. And that's what Pixle have delivered here. Long may their run of quality games continue!
-- Ewan Spence, April 2010.