Cover Orange: Best game since Cut the Rope?
If you like your physics-puzzlers cute, original, and fruit-based, Cover Orange is probably the best 99 cents (or $1.99 for iPad) you can spend in the App Store.
Last October I called Chillingo's Cut the Rope the best game since Angry Birds. And it appears the world agreed with me, as evidenced by its current number-three spot on the iTunes Top Paid Apps chart.
If you're looking for the next big thing in Cutesy Physics Puzzlers (or CPPs, as I like to call them), look no further: it's Cover Orange.
Weird title, I agree, but it's the literal explanation of the gameplay. In each level, you must shelter (i.e. cover) one or more oranges against the "poison rain" that pours in from an angry cloud.
To accomplish this, you're given one or more tools (it varies from level to level) to drop strategically. In an early, easy level, for example, you simply have to drop a box so it lands directly over the orange. Later on, you'll work with things like wagon wheels, dropping them on windmills to make them spin (and fling your orange to a safe spot).
Dropping/placing your last tool triggers the cloud, and there's no going back--your setup either worked or failed. Fortunately, there's a restart icon right in the corner for quick (and unlimited) do-overs.
The game is relentlessly cute, from the insidiously peppy theme music to the manically expressive oranges, which shake in fear as the cloud passes overhead and then chuckle giddily after realizing they're safe.
The levels vary widely in difficulty, often swinging from easy to near-impossible and back again. And some rely a bit on the luck of when and how your tools drop--meaning even if you do everything exactly right, your oranges might get fried.
But no matter. Cover Orange is instantly accessible, wholly addictive, and thoroughly entertaining--just like Angry Birds and Cut the Rope. You'll inevitably find yourself saying, "Just one more level." In my book, that's the mark of a CPP champ.
The game sells for 99 cents; the iPad HD version runs $1.99 (and there's a free trial version of that as well, though not yet for iPhone/iPod).
Do you think Cover Orange has the makings of a CPP superstar? Share your thoughts about the game (and others like it) in the comments.