Battle of Puppets ($1.99) has two things going for it right off the bat. For starters, the iPhone game has some of the best art design I’ve seen, complete with backgrounds that rotate and change as time progresses. The game is designed to take you inside 22 operas, where you will act out the battle scenes, more or less, and the scene-changing backgrounds feel very theater-esque.
And the second thing is that concept. The opera play-acting is a little different than your average “stab this guy for no reason” action-strategy game plot. It adds some depth to the genre and creates clear-cut missions for the player to work through as they trek across the in-game map to the various locales.
Despite these positives, Battle of Puppets is actually kind of a bore to play. The strategy in the game basically involves letting loose a string of troops to go wreak havoc on the enemy. There are various kinds of “soldiers” you can unleash, and you have a budget for how many you can use. In theory, this would lead to some sort of strategic planning based on your enemy’s own strengths and weaknesses.
Instead, you basically end up throwing everything against the wall and seeing what sticks. And the battles are tedious and slow in the early going, enough so that it makes it hard to continue playing to see if they get any better.
Bravo for the excellent art design, but this is one you can skip otherwise. In a mobile game market where you might not have much time to play a game, it’s tough to recommend waiting around for this one to get interesting.
The developer of this application is an Appolicious advertiser. This editorial review was written independent of all advertising considerations.
