iSpacePort Will Stay Out of My Orbit

iSpacePort [rating: 2.5/5]

If you love Flight Control then LuckyBastards, the developers of this app, would hope that you will love this take on the genre too. However, even at 99c I would advise against it as this pales into insignificance compared to the sublime joy of playing Flight Control.

Setting a game out of space should make designing the graphics pretty simple, a dark sky, some stars and well placed planets should be enough, but when they are the back drop for some poor looking spaceships and out of proportion satellites it makes them appear badly drawn and animated.

Simple controls are all well and good but if they aren’t executed well they can make the game frustrating and cumbersome. The premise of iSpacePort is to direct spaceships to their spaceports which are color co-ordinated for the spaceships and satellites. This is done by dragging your finger from the spaceship to the port.

Unfortunately the lines aren’t smooth as you direct the craft to land and the level of accuracy on directing them to there landing spots is so high that you can often miss them completely causing them to crash into other craft. If you do notice that they’ve missed though it would be nice to be able to simply turn them around, unfortunately making tight turns is not easy either and you end up looping your craft back round again in a larger arc than you would like too.

There are some nice things about the game, leaving me to think that a future update could turn things around for Flight Control wannabe. For example, in addition to docking your craft you also have to avoid meteor showers that have the potential of smashing your craft to smithereens and as the game progress you also have the task of rescuing spacemen as they fly out of the spaceport run the risk of an eternity orbiting the earth.

The music is nice and atmospheric too to with nice effects as you successfully dock each craft adding to the audio. There are three spacestations to play with only an initial one unlocked when you start and subsequent ones opening up as you progress. More space stations are also promised in future episodes.

The game is only for a single player and the high score table is local only with the only options on offer being those to control the sound level of the Sound FX and Music.

iSpacePort definitely has the potential of becoming a great little app however until the poor controls and poor looking spacecraft are addressed this is one game that is going to stay out of my orbit.

App Store Badge

Price: $.99

The Good

  • Spacemen and meteors add extra difficulty
  • Good sound and atmosphere

The Not So Good

Reviewed By: Craig Willis

iSpacePort Gameplay Video

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2 Comments on “iSpacePort Will Stay Out of My Orbit”

  1. evan1981

    I think the animation is good

    simple and fun

    I give 4+ for this app

    Online score will be great, but as i've heard the next update has online score

  2. evan1981

    I think the animation is good

    simple and fun

    I give 4+ for this app

    Online score will be great, but as i've heard the next update has online score

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