RetroSpaced
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Xbox Live-enabled games may be getting all the attention right at Pocket Gamer when it comes to Windows Phone 7, but that’s not to say we haven’t been also keeping an eye on the burgeoning indie portion of the Zune Marketplace.

Most games have admittedly looked poor, but there’s also the odd one that shows potential.

One of the first to break from the crowd is the attractive looking twin-stick shooter, Retrospaced, coming fresh from developer Jonathan Yong, and priced at a wallet-friendly 99p.

Indie-pedance day

The planet is, inevitably, under attack from extraterrestrial invaders, hell bent on abducting various coloured individuals from an island city. Your job, as a yellow bi-plane, is to stop them using your cannons and bombs.

There are 10 stages in the Story mode, each requiring a certain number of points to be met before moving on to the next. Annoyingly, the next level only unlocks if you either die or hit the arbitrary (and non-heralded) ending for a stage, which will no doubt catch a lot of people out the first time they play

The game uses the traditional twin-stick virtual joystick setup, which works smoothly and responsively, with an additional 'shake to release' action for bombs.

Beam me up, civvie

Along with the standard 'shoot everything that isn’t your character' gameplay mechanic, there are also a number of UFOs that race into the level and start beaming up hapless innocents wearing a particular colour of shirt.

Instead of destroying the craft, your plucky biplane has to pick up these civilians before their health runs down and deliver them to a similarly-coloured hot-air balloon, located at the corners of the map.

Three civvies can hold onto the biplane simultaneously, so later stages (and the Survival mode) become as much about getting the little chaps to safety in the most efficient order as shooting the villainous aliens out of the sky.

Down and dirty

Despite the generally eye-catching backgrounds and smooth controls, Retrospaced is a very rough-and-ready game, with basic-looking models, few stages, and generic gameplay.

The colours of the background images – especially the sunset variations of the two maps – tend to blend in with the creatures in the foreground far too easily, leading to the majority of deaths feeling unfair.

There’s also no suspend option available, which is a terrible oversight, especially considering the length at which the latter stages and the survival mode can last for.

As a cheap and cheerful alternative to the slick but expensive games that populate the Xbox Live portion of the Zune Marketplace, Retrospaced is a decent stab from essentially a one-man team, but it’s not going to be dragging you away from the big titles just yet.

RetroSpaced

Retrospaced is a cheap and cheerful twin-stick shooter that needs a little more tuning before it can properly take flight
Score
Will Wilson
Will Wilson
Will's obsession with gaming started off with sketching Laser Squad levels on pads of paper, but recently grew into violently shouting "Tango Down!" at random strangers on the street. He now directs that positive energy into his writing (due in no small part to a binding court order).