Some monkey games, it seems, are more equal than others.
Tiki Towers is one of the most addictive strategy games for the iPad. The $4.99 app blends architecture, strategy, and physics with cute monkey noises and bananas; what a great combo! Once I started playing, I couldn’t keep my stinking paws off it. The game consists of a basic landscape, with five bananas floating in the air, a starting place and an ending place. It also includes five boxed monkeys ready to be let loose, and a certain amount of sticks that you can use to create a bridge/tower/walkway to get the monkeys from point A to point B. Each level is completed by having each monkey reaching a banana and making it across the structure without it collapsing.
Tiki Towers is nearly impossible to put down not only because it actually takes thought to win, but its also just plain funny. Watching the monkeys swinging back and forth across your structure until they either reach their desired banana is a trip. As is watching them fall mercilessly to their deaths. Sometimes my structure would collapse from too much swinging or from too much weight, so structural integrity must be taken into account.
At the top of the screen, the app shows the five monkey faces, which become smiley faces filled with a banana when they each get a banana, or a skull if and when they plunge to their demise. Sometimes they become confused when they can’t reach a banana, which is funny at first, but then frustrating, as I found myself wanting to get a perfect score for each level. The graphics are pretty cool, like a cartoon; colorful and playful, just like the game play. The sound effects are minimal, but appropriate. I can’t wait to unlock the rest of the levels (islands) to see how hard the maps can become.
There are some drawbacks. Removing sticks from the structure sometimes became difficult and adding ones to certain places were sometimes hard. These both come down to a lack of exact precision from the game play/touch screen integration. Sometimes I just wanted to yell out ‘It’s a mad house! A mad house!’ but that would be mostly for my impatience. Overall, this is a great game to keep your mind active, and won’t numb it…too much. I could definitely see myself spending an hour in my chair just laboring away at this game until all the levels are unlocked. However, I’m worried that after I beat all the levels, I might not go back to the game. Of all the ways I’ve tried to play with monkeys, this is for sure the safest way to do it…well, at least they haven’t tried to bite me.
