The Warrior can throw axes relentlessly!

Playing through InMotion’s Catacombs is a bit like playing a sophisticated Galaga: you avoid an army of attackers while spamming projectiles. The whole thing might produce a Mazer Rackham-esque legend should the events of Catacombs actually occur (two points if you get that).

The premise is simple: you’re a hero and you must crawl through dungeons and destroy the baddies who are threatening your homelands. What else can be said about our mysterious hero? Does he have a family? Is there a woman he is fighting valiantly to protect? Unfortunately we may never know. But what we do know about this harbinger of destruction is that he will tirelessly kick ass. If there were any names to be taken he would have enough to create baby naming books in six languages.

The 24-level campaign should take roughly three hours to complete. Levels last five to ten minutes due to the simple design, although they do seem to grow in size and difficulty as you progress and new monsters become available. While the graphics are nice, the levels do seem repetitive after the first five or so. I found myself skipping groups of monsters simply to progress faster once I realized collecting gold had no purpose aside from points. To slow down this aspect of the game, InMotion created a force field on level 12 which required running into a big orange Dragon Ball (pretty sure I saw Goku pop in on one map) in order to access the blocked areas.

The Good
What InMotion has avoided in background and story, they have made up for in gameplay and design. Catacombs is a traditional dungeon crawler done right, considering the platform. In place of a controller or joystick we have two circular pads: one that controls movement and one that controls projectiles. I’ll be honest this control system does take a little while to get used to. I was tapping the projectiles joystick for a few levels before I realized that you’re meant to simply hold it in a direction and shoot non-stop. Also, for someone with larger hands like myself it is quite sluggish. However, I can’t imagine a more effective controller scheme for this genre on the iPhone. All in all I think InMotion did a very nice job on this aspect of Catacombs.

Fully expanded UI.

The artwork is also a noteworthy aspect considering this is — after all — an iPhone game. I knew that it looked nice from the trailer but was pleasantly surprised by the overall quality of the art and scheme of the user interface. At no point did I think, “Man these guys need better artists.” Although I might have used that sentence when talking about the writers.

The Bad
It doesn’t matter if you want to be the archer, warrior, or mage because the projectile scheme is identical for all three. While the three playable classes are virtually triplets with differing artistic design, the lack of development in this area is negligible given the low replayability of this game.

Why the comment about the replay factor? The zero storyline and zero character uniqueness means if you play it once you’ve played it all. Sure each class has its own “special attack” but this is basically an area of effect “oh crap” button to get out of sticky situations. While it might appear different, the mechanic is the same. Ultimately that’s my primary complaint with this game: there simply isn’t enough content and story given how solid the design and art are.

Another frustrating situation — and this is common with many iPhone games — is that the autosave function didn’t activate mid-level if I received a phone call mid-game. So I could be right at the end of a lengthier dungeon and then get sent back to the beginning when Norman calls me to talk about pitching TMZ: Video Game Development. (He wants red carpet event coverage to get the nasty crotch shots of programmers as they leave galas or whatever soireé they might be attending. We’ll see what LA thinks.)

The WTF?
Reading the PR materials, I was given the impression the game would be this epic hero defending my people from the hordes of some demonic power. It’s funny how perception and reality differ. What I got instead was a situation where I was rampaging through the homeland of skeletons and bugs pillaging their hard-earned (or hoarded?) gold while leaving a mass of bodies in my wake of destruction. The complete lack of bosses detracts from any sense of accomplishment or direction. When coupled with the lack of a storyline you end up with a video game where it just becomes truly senseless killing.

The other oddity here was the lack of an upgrade system. Sure I could pickup random modifiers that would make me move faster, shoot faster, or wipe out entire rooms with the spread shot. I love how this is still one of the ultimate weapons in shooter games 20 years after Contra. But why am I collecting all of this gold if I’m not going to be able to get permanent upgrades? Perhaps I’m saving for my daughter’s dowry.

Al Fin
All in all, Catacombs isn’t a groundbreaking dungeon crawler: you’re essentially getting a pocket version of Gauntlet. I found it basically good for one play through and then a few levels using the other classes. However, given the platform, there really isn’t much to criticize aside from the lack of story. I’m not looking for a triple-A title with 60 hours of game play on my iPhone but rather just something to pick up and play when I’m waiting at the doctor’s office or for the movie previews to begin and Catacombs delivers so long as you keep your desires simple and look at it as a time killer.

B

Exceeds Expectations
+ Control system works surprisingly well.
+ Streamlined character select and level progression.
+ Great art design, one of the nicer looking iPhone games out there.
+ Runs smoothly and seems very well polished
Needs Improvement
- Could have used more character design.
- Upgrade system needs to be implemented.
- Lack of variety in monster abilities, bosses?