Minigore HD

And so the high-res rampage of upscaled iPhone games continues. Minigore HD, a twin-stick shooter in the vein of Geometry Wars, is one of many titles to receive the “HD” treatment and get a big bump in its price tag. The iPhone/iPod touch version goes for NZ $1.29, while the iPad version is rather pricier at $6.49. Is the increased resolution enough to justify this disparity?

The premise of Minigore HD is simple. Using your left thumb to move and your right thumb to shoot, you must strafe around a contained area blasting ever-increasing numbers of bad guys. Virtual analog sticks appear wherever you place your thumbs, so you don’t need to worry about keeping them in a particular spot on the touch screen. As the difficulty increases, you’ll find it harder and harder to survive, although weapon upgrades and other bonuses will help you out. Once you die, your score is tallied and you can either move on to a different location or try again on that level.

And… that’s about it. While different areas are on hand to play in, and a night/day cycle continuously rolls over, they are largely superficial in their effect on the gameplay. This is a simple survival game, and while you can set the difficulty up higher for a challenge, it’s always going to grow stale fairly quickly.

This was less of a problem for Minigore on the iPhone — its gameplay is best appreciated in small burts, which perfectly fits a portable device. But on the iPad, you might just grow tired of the relatively monotonous experience and find something more engaging to play. To justify the price increase, the developers really needed to add some additional modes to liven things up. Geometry Wars does it to great effect, so why can’t Minigore?

The graphics are undoubtedly the best part of Minigore HD. The art style is blocky and exaggerated, and the 3D locations are very well-realised, with various weather effects adding nicely to the proceedings. For a short time, it’s nice to simply wander the levels and reflect on what the iPad is capable of. It’s almost a shame that graphics like these are being put to such a shallow use.

If you’re a compulsive type of person with a strong need for twin-stick survival shooters, by all means check out Minigore HD. Just know that there isn’t all that much here to keep you coming back. And if you have both an iPhone/iPod touch and an iPad, definitely go with the portable edition — it’s cheaper, and simply fits better on the smaller device.

As it stands, I can’t recommend this game to most people. However, keep an eye on it if you’re on the fence — apparently future updates will add multiplayer and other goodies. It’s not like Minigore HD does anything badly; it’s just that what it does have isn’t enough.