Hi there, gamers! Do you want a fun game on the iPad that isn’t a huge, ad-ridden money trap? Try Punch Quest. Punch Quest is a fun combination of endless runner/beat-em-up. So, it’s all about how far you can get punching through zombies, skeletons, monsters, and demons! Tapping the right side of the screen keeps your player punching and running. But, also, tapping the left side of the screen does a little flying uppercut move. Another tap pounds the ground in a sort of combo.
Those aren’t the only moves in your arsenal! Along the way in your punching frenzy, you’ll get power-ups like grillin’ fists,(They shoot fireballs!) and iron fists that protect you from harm for a bit, and make you stronger! And finally, there’s a raptor that shoots lasers out of it’s mouth. You read that right. If that doesn’t make you excited to play this game, you must be dead inside. A laser-shooting dinosaur!
Yes, Punch Quest sounds like something a hyperactive five-year-old dreamed up. But, that’s fine by me. It’s fast-paced, fun, and unapologetically wacky. As far as I know, the only thing that would make this game inaccessible is the speed. But, the speed is also good for racking up points. If you punch out two or more guys, it leads to a combo. Combos multiply your points.
Points can unlock new techniques and armor. Luckily, this uses app in-game points only to buy things. Not real money! So, if you’re looking for a quick bit of fun, download it. And enjoy! There are boss fights, but since it’s an endless runner, the only thing that really counts is how long you hold out, and the points you score. It’s very replayable. Radical! With its simplicity, speed, breezy controls, and fun, it’s certainly worth a download.
And it’s cheap! There are so few good accessible games that Punch Quest certainly punches its way to the top of my list. Oh, and I haven’t even unlocked new techniques yet. But, I have beaten one boss…a flying skull! How cool is that? Go download it for all of $0.99! (When I got it, it was free. But, the price seems to have gone up!) Punch your way to greater and greater glory! All in all, this is one gnarly iPad game. 5/5 stars!
FINAL GRADE: A
ACCESSIBILITY GRADE: A+ (You control the entire game just by tapping sides.)
FORGIVENESS FACTOR: A (It‘s very fun, and replayable. See how long you can hold out!)
TOUCHSCREEN CONTROL: A- (Kind of fast, but still incredibly easy to play, and fun!)
IPAD ACCESSIBILITY REVIEW: INJUSTICE: GODS AMONG US
When I saw Injustice Gods Among Us available for free on the iPad, I couldn’t resist. It’s one of the hottest games out this season, and I’m always up for a good comic book-based fighting game. I get to punch people? As a superhero/villain? Sign me up. At best, it will be almost as good as the home console version. At worst, it’ll be a cheesy knock-off, littered with pay-to-play content that I‘ll just avoid like Kryptonite. I don’t have instant access to a home console so for me, this was too good to pass up. It makes me want to try the home console version!
A short tutorial explains the basics of combat. To my surprise, it isn’t really turn-based combat; but neither is it exactly real-time. Rather there seems to be an amount of time attacks can take. The rest depends on tap speed and swipes for “hard” attacks. The most difficult for me is to block, which requires pressing two fingers down quickly on the iPad. Typically, I solve this by turning the iPad more towards me so that my two fingers register, instead of my two fingernails. But, as reaction time is a factor, it’s still an issue, but I’m learning ways around it. I guess you could say, one advantage of the iPad version is that the characters are usually in fixed positions, unless knocked down or performing a superpower. This, for me, is advantage; I don’t worry about moving AND attacking. But, it is obviously a limitation of the iPad game, and I’d like to see the “real game.”
Thus, it’s not really a fighting game, but then few iPad games are. It’s more like a fighting game/role-playing game, where you buy equipment, and level up to improve stats, attacks, and superpowers. The superpowers are fun to watch! And you unlock more (Up to three.) as you level up. Mercifully, characters can be gained by winning fights, but it’s a bummer that all characters aren’t readily available. Unless…guess what? You pay or get in-game points! No thanks, I‘ll wait to get Batman and Superman; even though that’s HALF the reasons anyone will GET the game. So, finding out my starting roster was Green Arrow, Green Lantern, and Solomon Grundy…yeah, I was a little mad. But, my faith in the game was renewed when I unlocked Catwoman after 2 fights. I never claimed that this was better than the actual game; I just wanted to see the superpowers and the fights!
The superpowers are activated by tapping the superpower bar once you’ve dealt enough damage and it fills up. Now, here’s where some accessibility issues come in for me. Obviously, I’ve got to do swipes for hard attacks, but that’s not too difficult, although probably any other game I would’ve been more harsh on, but I just love a good fighting game/comic book throw-down. I can usually get away with just tapping as fast as I can, and then attempting a swipe at the end, for a knockdown blow. The superpowers on the other hand require different motions to deal more damage; but they typically do a lot of damage regardless if you increase the damage with the motions or not; plus, they’re fun to watch, and add some strategy to the game as to when to use them. There’s a tag-team system (three heroes each fight) where you tap on a character to bring him/her in. And idle heroes heal, too, when not fighting…so it adds a little more accessibility, in that if things get tough, just bring in the “Tank”; or use a superpower for a knockdown and tag out.
For example, two of my favorites right now are Green Lantern and Catwoman. Lantern’s “Turbine Engine” superpower (He rams an engine of green ring energy into the opponents face!) increases damage with rapid taps. Catwoman’s cat claws increase damage with vertical and horizontal swipes. Of the characters I have, Green Arrow’s “Electric Arrow” is probably the easiest, and usually does about 53 damage regardless. When activated, a cross-hair appears, and it just says, “Tap to shoot”. Well, okay then! I can do that. The hardest and most powerful thus far is my Solomon Grundy, but, he’s obviously a “Tank”. Catwoman is DPS. I’ve won fights just by tapping really fast with the cat claws. Each fighter has their own strategies, but if you play RPGs…it’s easy enough to handle.
Overall, my biggest letdown is that you have to unlock characters/skills with points and (No thank you.) real money. I’ve been imagining these fights forever in my head, as I imagine most others have. My fantasy battles though didn’t exactly include Solomon Grundy vs. Nightwing. I wanted to see Superman vs. Batman, like everyone else! But, the game is so engaging to me, that I’m willing to get through it all, and unlock them. I’d be more harsh on the game’s block mechanism, if I didn’t like seeing the fights so much. My own bias, but there you go! I’m going to have some great DIY physical therapy with the game’s fast-paced battles. There are a few dexterity issues such as superpower moves, but I’ll learn quickly, or else just outsmart the iPad and hold it at different angles. That said, I really like the game, but would prefer it had more heroes and more fighting-game elements than RPG elements. Injustice, indeed!
In conclusion, I’m mostly satisfied with the game because I get to see comic book fights. But, I’d rather not spend points and money for equipment, skills, and characters. (Though I don’t know if that also applies to the home console versions.) In addition, I’ve developed my own strategies around some iPad accessibility issues; and I WANT to master them! Which is saying a lot. But, in my opinion, one of the advantages of a 100% fighting game is being able to dive right in and fight, even if you just button mash. Some say cheap, I say accessible! So, in the end, it’s a great game visually, with some dexterity issues, and some iPad limitations. Some of these (like fixed fighting positions.) are good; others (like blocking and supermoves.) are difficult, and still others (like pay-to-play content.) are unforgivably unjust!
But, I can learn ways around the difficult things. In fact, I want to. It’s a small obstacle for having this great little comic book fight simulator in my hand. I just have to work at unlocking characters and finding out which combos of hero teams works best. If the game has a Kryptonite though, it would be not letting me start the game with Superman and Batman! And I haven’t even unlocked Superman…so perhaps I should say…yellow ring? No, it’s just not the same! Also, all the heroes profiles are represented by cards. Why’s everything in an RPG have to be a card now? I blame Magic: The Gathering. Still have to see the “real game”!
The app store description of Minecraft: Pocket Edition says, “Imagine it. Build it. Create worlds on the go, with Minecraft: Pocket Edition!” I would add: (If you’re able-bodied.) Let me describe to you my first experience playing Minecraft on this device. Minecraft is like Legos, except you build and “craft” things from the environment around you, usually found underground (Hence, “Mining”+ “crafting” = Minecraft.) or if you need wood, you chop down a tree, which gives you a block of wood, etc. First rule of Minecraft for me, (In the game’s Survival Mode.) is to build a shelter first, to protect myself from monsters.
Ordinarily, this means chopping down a tree. Fair enough. But, here you have something worse than a virtual joystick or compass: A virtual keypad. I understand there’s always a learning curve with Minecraft, but the bottom line is the control of the keypad is just too sensitive, and not well-spaced. A jump button is in the middle. As if the keypad wasn’t bad enough, you have to swipe to move around the camera. Holding down the tap for just a second switches from using an item (Like an axe to chop wood.) to examining items. The end result was I was half dancing around this tree while trying to cut it down.
Which is bad not just because I could barely control it, but because the monsters come out at nightfall. I wasted time dancing around a tree and getting my blocks. I had no shelter. Several zombies emerged, and I hastily dug a ditch in the dirt to protect myself, which meant swiping the camera down to look at the ground and several fast taps to dig, lazily shuffling into my ditch while looking at the ground. Yeah, the zombie knocked me out of the ditch.
So, you’re thinking: “Well, you have an axe. Just turn around and whack him!” I was thinking the same; except I instead of you. This means I had to tap back to the axe, swipe to the right, swipe to look at the zombie and tap, no! don’t examine the zombie! Tap to attack it. Oh, and it was attacking me all the while, so I was being knocked around. I died. Re-spawned. I died again. Re-spawned. And again! From the same single zombie! So, when I re-spawned the fourth time I just ran far away into a nearby tundra. From there, I built a ruddy little log cabin with naught but two spaces to move around in over the course of two game days. Now, ordinarily, building in-game takes patience, I understand that. Sometimes, you click the wrong places; things get built wrong, whatever. But, the interface between: use item, build, and examine all done with taps really creates a problem. You’ll be destroying things you built, looking at them, and building where you want to destroy.
Now, once I had my little ramshackle roof over my head (it had a door even!) I wanted to go hunting. As luck would have it, the tundra had plenty of sheep and pigs. Pigs can be hunted for meat, and sheep for wool. Maybe I’d make a bed! (Bed = 3 wood planks + 3 wool.) But, as usual, I found myself examining sheep, and even being pushed (not attacked, though.) around by pigs once I attacked. Only one sheep dropped 2 wool blocks. I ran back to my log cabin. Pushed around by pigs, for crying out loud! Seemed like I’d have to avoid every critter in the game on top of monsters!
I like the idea of Minecraft. I just think the iPad, with its tap formats (which you can’t change around at all.) are really ill-suited for those of us with mobility impairments. I have to say I did enjoy building things and crafting tools, when it went right! But, when it came down to I can’t even dig a ditch right (while staring at the ground!), or attack a zombie because my swipes and taps (upward or downward.) don’t register; that’s not a patience issue. That’s an accessibility issue. If I had a mouse and keyboard, I would’ve seen that zombie, and killed it in three clicks. I’d have had a bed from all the wool (maybe.) and I would’ve made those bully pigs into pork instead of dancing around them awkwardly.
Now, there is a “Creative Mode” aside from “Survival Mode”. Creative Mode gets rid of the monsters, gives you infinite resources, and lets you fly around instead of jump. It basically just lets you build. This mode was slightly more enjoyable. Did it make the controls any less frustrating? No! But, no monsters to worry about. Building is still awkward. In Creative Mode, I just carved a dwelling out of a cave, and put a door on it. I wasn’t even in the mood to imagine! I just wanted the controls to work!
Hunting was still as abysmal. Only this time, I had ducks that kept getting through my door. (Some kind of game glitch?) I will say Creative Mode is better for exploring, but then: Why build shelter? I know, I know. To exercise your imagination. But, with a control system this bad, and half the challenge gone, the only thing I could imagine was playing a better app!
Creative Mode does offer more accessibility, but at expense of half of the game, and the controls are still the same; that horrible keypad! The terrible tap sensitivity! (And, no re-mapping is available.) It does feel a little less stressful, but the controls just try to do to much with the various taps and motions, and don‘t appear to have had the mobility impaired in mind. A sad thing for such a creativity-based game.
In conclusion, if you’re mobility impaired, the touchscreen commands may be a bit much. I know Minecraft has a big world to offer, and it’s fun to look at, but I want to build things and hunt and to survive zombie attacks. The swiping for me to turn around then having to use the keypad to move separately means those pigs will just walk on by you, and the zombies will eat you before you have your first plank laid. It’s very confusing, and frustrating that I can’t build what’s in my mind. I would play this game to escape my physical limits, not to be constantly reminded of them. Because of running from monsters at night, I felt like I was playing a weird 3D version of Castlevania 2: WHAT A HORRIBLE NIGHT TO HAVE A CURSE. ;-)
FINAL GRADE: F
ACCESSIBILITY GRADE: C (Creative Mode has no monsters.)
FORGIVENESS FACTOR: D (Can re-spawn; but not often helpful accessibility-wise.)
TOUCHSCREEN CONTROL: F (Virtual keypad; sensitive-command taps, swipe-based camera.)
(AHH!!! A ZOMBIE!!! AHH!!! GRAPHIC/INTERFACE OVERLAP!!! RUN!!!)
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