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| Infinity Blade Logo |
With all of that said, I finally got around to playing this app for my iPhone and it is amazing! Just for a quick clarification, yes I used the words "got around to playing," as in I've had this sitting on my phone for the past month or so and never even touched it. I bought it on sale during the July 4th holiday and just never touched it because I had too many other things to do. With that said, here's my review.
Infinity Blade [2010]
So the game starts out pretty quickly with a well-done (and maybe even a bit over-done) tutorial that gets you through how to battle. And they give you a really good starting amount of health as well, an added bonus since for the first few minutes you'll be taking a couple of hits. But in no-time at all, I had the easy to handle system down and was walking around and playing with things. In other words, this game is a quick and easy pick-up if you've never played it before.
After that, the fun really begins. This game is simplistic in design, yet deep in story and action. You basically tap places to go and battle guys as you search to avenge your father in a one-of-a-kind castle. Now, the exploration is okay in its myst-style of click-and-go adventure, and to be honest it was the least fun part of the game while I was playing, but the baddies you meet along the way are what really make this game fun. They are small, they are large, they have things that will clobber you, they have things that will block you, and yet still they manage to make it a rewarding system.
So let me go into a bit more detail on the combat. Basically, where you slash is where your sword goes. You can also tap buttons at the bottom of the screen to roll out of the way or use your shield, to which I almost never remember. At the top corners of your screen are two more buttons, one for your super attack and one for your magic. After that, that is pretty much it if I don't describe the health bars. So then where's the fun if you have a few buttons and you swipe? Well, the guys you are fighting are not just statues and will attack and black you as well. So you have to figure out how to string together moves to hit them or counter them. The game starts out pretty slow, one hit to the next not really being a challenge, and then as you get better it starts to speed up. It sounds kind of lame, but in an adrenaline rush sort of way it is just plain and simple fun.
The last cool thing I want to say is they have a level-up system that works well. So obviously your character can level-up, I mean this is an RPG. But how he levels up is based on you picking which skills you think you need. Every level you get two points and you have a lot of places you can put them. But this is only scratching the surface of the level-up system. You can also "level-up" your weapons as well, by which I mean after using them for so long they will become mastered. For mastering your weapon you get another level-up point to spend on your main character. Add in a store to buy more weapons, and you get the idea of why I would like this. It gives people like me, people that crave things to complete, something more to do.
Before the Smartphone Switch
I just wanted to note that Infinity Blade was not originally going to be developed for Smartphones, but instead for the Xbox Kinect. To be fully honest, I am kind of shocked they are not going to re-release it on the kinect much like Fruit Ninja was a little while ago. But I can also see why they decided not to.
I'm not going to lie when I say the Kinect is a fun, intelligent way to get kids up and moving on those lazier days. However, the thing that everyone I know and everyone that has played it has noticed is that the system lags. It has a few bugs that seem to have trouble reading where you are in the room and it needs time to process what is happening, and I am not blaming that on Microsoft for making it but more because they just do not have the technological fire-power needed to really run it smoothly. So maybe on the next device we will get an upgrade version of the Kinect, but until then I needed to note that it has lag.
That is why Infinity Blade will probably not be coming to the Kinect. It is a fast-paced game where timing can be everything on your slashes. So when you take a system that lags and ask people to perfectly time their body movements, it becomes harder for people to enjoy. Which is the original reasoning why Epic Games decided to pull it from Kinect and put it on the smartphones, which were just starting to become more than powerful enough to hold better-graphics video games.
The Spotted Canvas uses the Infinity Blade® application programming interface but is not endorsed or certified by Epic Games, Inc. All of the Infinity Blade® logos and trademarks displayed on this website are the property of Epic Games, Inc.
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| Opening Title of the Game |
So let me go into a bit more detail on the combat. Basically, where you slash is where your sword goes. You can also tap buttons at the bottom of the screen to roll out of the way or use your shield, to which I almost never remember. At the top corners of your screen are two more buttons, one for your super attack and one for your magic. After that, that is pretty much it if I don't describe the health bars. So then where's the fun if you have a few buttons and you swipe? Well, the guys you are fighting are not just statues and will attack and black you as well. So you have to figure out how to string together moves to hit them or counter them. The game starts out pretty slow, one hit to the next not really being a challenge, and then as you get better it starts to speed up. It sounds kind of lame, but in an adrenaline rush sort of way it is just plain and simple fun.
The last cool thing I want to say is they have a level-up system that works well. So obviously your character can level-up, I mean this is an RPG. But how he levels up is based on you picking which skills you think you need. Every level you get two points and you have a lot of places you can put them. But this is only scratching the surface of the level-up system. You can also "level-up" your weapons as well, by which I mean after using them for so long they will become mastered. For mastering your weapon you get another level-up point to spend on your main character. Add in a store to buy more weapons, and you get the idea of why I would like this. It gives people like me, people that crave things to complete, something more to do.
Before the Smartphone Switch
I just wanted to note that Infinity Blade was not originally going to be developed for Smartphones, but instead for the Xbox Kinect. To be fully honest, I am kind of shocked they are not going to re-release it on the kinect much like Fruit Ninja was a little while ago. But I can also see why they decided not to.
I'm not going to lie when I say the Kinect is a fun, intelligent way to get kids up and moving on those lazier days. However, the thing that everyone I know and everyone that has played it has noticed is that the system lags. It has a few bugs that seem to have trouble reading where you are in the room and it needs time to process what is happening, and I am not blaming that on Microsoft for making it but more because they just do not have the technological fire-power needed to really run it smoothly. So maybe on the next device we will get an upgrade version of the Kinect, but until then I needed to note that it has lag.
That is why Infinity Blade will probably not be coming to the Kinect. It is a fast-paced game where timing can be everything on your slashes. So when you take a system that lags and ask people to perfectly time their body movements, it becomes harder for people to enjoy. Which is the original reasoning why Epic Games decided to pull it from Kinect and put it on the smartphones, which were just starting to become more than powerful enough to hold better-graphics video games.
The Spotted Canvas uses the Infinity Blade® application programming interface but is not endorsed or certified by Epic Games, Inc. All of the Infinity Blade® logos and trademarks displayed on this website are the property of Epic Games, Inc.
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