Wednesday App Review: Parallyzed

parallyzed

Doing this weekly segment, I have played a lot of app games. Some of them are awesome, and some of them are not. And, generally speaking, I don’t review the games that I find to be unenjoyable. This means that sometimes I’ll try three or four apps before I find one I want to write about. This is because I understand that games are widely dependent on the right kinds of users, and I try and take that into account when I’m trying out something new. I wouldn’t want to bash something great simply because it’s not my style. However, for the app Parallyzed, I am going to make an exception. Not because the game was actually bad, but because of how much I hated the way the game (even the paid version) handled ads. There really aren’t many things more frustrating to me than ads in the middle of a game. For this reason, I’ll often not even hesitate to pay for a game that I enjoy, and neither should you. Developers deserve to be paid for their work, just like anyone else. I get that, and I’ll gladly pay for an app that I consider worth the money. However, what I cannot abide are greedy developers, and that’s exactly the kind of vibe I got from playing Parallyzed. The game costs $3 to play past level 4, which is a little more than I normally spend, but I didn’t feel it was unreasonable. What drove me up the wall is that the mandatory $3 does not remove ads. In fact, there are more ads after you pay than before, which is incredibly sneaky. And, to make things worse, there are ads everywhere. screenshot_2016-12-05-16-28-49There’s an ad when you open the settings. There are ads when you die (which happens a lot). There are ads when you don’t die. There are even in-game prompts to watch more ads to retry the level (although those were spotty in working for me, and past a certain level the prompts stopped, and you had no choice about ads at all even though it would have been more useful in higher levels). It is absolutely obnoxious and feels like the developers are being greedy. I already paid for the game—why am I watching ads that pay you for me playing the game which I already bought? It’s double-dipping, plain and simple. And, to make things worse, the ads are all the obnoxious video ads which can’t be skipped until a few seconds in. Video ads belong in free games, not in paid games. As far as actual gameplay and such, it isn’t too bad. The music is kind of pretty, and visuals are well done. A lot of the reviews talked about how great the story was, but other than the cut scene at the opening (which was super vague) up to level 11 there were no other cut scenes. You are just wandering through side-scrolling levels, avoiding obstacles. Which is totally fine, but I expected a cool story too judging by the developer advertising a “twisted story of two sisters.” I suppose if I finished the game there would be another cut scene with the sister waking up, but I hardly call that an engaging story—more just a colorful decoration for a side-scrolling platformer. Normally, I simply adore games like Parallyzed. It has a beautiful color scheme, very simple yet surprisingly challenging gameplay, a good soundtrack, and some decent graphics behind it, but I simply could not get past the ads. And, once you get much past about level 8, it just feels incredibly repetitious and predictable. While they will change which part of the screen the characters run on, it’s either too hard or not hard enough, and the tapping isn’t always responsive and doesn’t always make sense. Sometimes it will flag you and you’ll die, and other times you can scrape by. Obviously something in the coding is a little weird.   I didn’t finish the game as I became too frustrated after about level 11, but I did read a few reviews about a second pay wall. I didn’t encounter that problem, and I sincerely hope that isn’t the case. Regardless, I wouldn’t recommend this game to anyone who doesn’t just really really love ads. Especially the loud video ads that disrupt the game. The kind you can’t click through. If you love those kinds of ads and have $3 to spare, then you can download Parallyzed for iOS or Android for free. But personally, if you’re looking for a cool platformer, I think you could do better.]]>

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