Breakout was never so much fun!
Written by: Toxin
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Four years ago Tom Darby foisted
Jardinains! onto an
unsuspecting world. Now he's back with the sequel, appropriately
called Jardinains 2, with
improved graphics, more features and more music.
Jardinains!, with its
intriguing power-ups, cheesy renditions of In The Hall of
the Mountain King and other
music, inventive levels, and cute, bouncy garden gnomes (the “'nains”
of the title), was a smash success, if you'll pardon the pun. On the
face of it, it looks as if Jardinains 2
will be every bit as successful as its predecessor.
It wouldn't be
entirely inaccurate to call either game “Breakout with
knobs on”, but it wouldn't be entirely fair, either. Who
remembers countless hours spent sat in front of an Atari 2600 with
its silly paddle controller, trying frantically to bounce a white
blob into some coloured blobs? Well, Jardinains 2 is about as
far removed from that as it is possible to get while remaining
recognisably a Breakout clone. Even Arkanoid and its
derivatives pale in comparison with this bundle of fun.
The object of the
game is, of course, to remove all breakable bricks from the screen to
advance to the next level where, as a reward, one gets to do it all
over again. The original Jardinains! had bricks of only one
size. Jardinains 2 introduces differently-sized bricks, which
gives greater scope for artistry when designing the levels. You can
smash to pieces the Stars & Stripes, some hanging spiders, a
flower growing out of the ground, what looks like an octopus, and
more. And, if you're suitably bored or inspired, you can even use the
built-in level editor to create your own.
But breaking bricks
isn't all there is. Oh no, not by a long shot. Some bricks drop
power-ups, some of which are beneficial, some of which are positively
detrimental. Depending on the power-ups you collect, you can have a
paddle which shoots laser beams, lightning bolts, ice bolts or fire
bolts. You can also have a ball which smashes through anything on the
screen whether it's considered breakable or not, a ball which is on
fire, a ball which is a lump of ice, a ball which is a combination of
the two, and even multiple balls. You can even, if you're not
careful, end up with a ball which shoots around the screen almost
faster than the eye can see, and a paddle which has suddenly shrunk
in size...
And
that's still not all there is. One mustn't forget the
delightful critters which give the game its name: that's right, the
'nains. They live in the bricks, you know, and they take umbrage at
your eagerness to destroy those bricks. The original Jardinains!
had just one type of 'nain, which would demonstrate its
objections to your activities by dropping flowerpots towards your
paddle. If a flowerpot hit, your paddle would freeze for a moment. If
lots of flowerpots hit, it could be some time before you regained
control, by which time it was highly likely the ball had already
disappeared off the bottom of the screen.
Jardinains 2
still has those pesky 'nains and their flowerpots, and introduces
some friends such as the zombie 'nain which drops bones and squishes
unpleasantly when it bounces off your paddle, the robot 'nain which
drops spanners, the ninja 'nain which is all in black and drops
shuriken, and, last but by no means least, the pirate 'nain, which
drops anchors and makes a delightfully squeaky, high-pitched
“Yarrrr!” sound.
Ah, yes.
Bouncing them off your paddle. If you hit a 'nain with the ball, or
hit the brick it's on, it will tumble to its doom. If you're quick
enough, you can intercept it with your paddle and bounce it around a
bit. Each time you bounce a 'nain you will receive points. Those
points double for each successful bounce. Eventually the 'nain will
tremble and explode into a power-up which you can then collect or
ignore, as you choose.
Jardinains 2
is available for Windows, Linux and OSX. The game will run either
full-screen or in a window. Under Windows you can choose to use
DirectX or OpenGL. The game comes with a “per household”
license, not a “per computer” license, which is rather
generous on the author's part. It also supports multiple players if
you have several household members who want to play the game on one
PC. The options also allow you to control the quality of the
graphics, useful if you're playing on older hardware, as well as
whether to have silence, sound, cheesy music, or both.
The
full version of Jardinains 2
costs US$19.99, plus appropriate taxes, and contains 300 levels, but
one may download a free version of the game which contains 50 levels
and which doesn't have all the power-ups. Twenty bucks is dirt-cheap
for a game of this calibre, especially when one considers that it
comes complete with the level pack from the original Jardinains!.
That's right; you're getting effectively two games for the price of
one here. The original Jardinains! came
on a CD if one desired; at the moment it is only possible to obtain
Jardinains 2 via
download. If the author has any plans to produce a CD of the game he
isn't saying anything yet.
In
short, this is a top-notch game. It's simple, fun, and entertaining.
Tom Darby has produced a winner. Buy it now, from
http://www.jardinains2.com/
By the
way, I bought my copy before writing this review. I've not been
bribed in any way.
Copyright © by LWD All Rights Reserved.
