Pangolin is a cute little puzzle-platformer for iOS that might either drive you mad with rage or mad to the point of insanity. Or both. It’s tricky, challenging, and offers plenty of repeat play opportunities.
The pangolin of the title is a curled-up creature who, for reasons only ever known to game designers, has to get from one place to another in a series of increasingly complicated 2-d puzzle worlds.
Your task is to provide trampolines for the pangolin to bounce on. Bounce in the right direction and to the right height, and your pangolin will get to where he needs to be. Needless to say, you only have a limited number of trampolines for each level.
To create one, you just tap with two fingers. The further apart your fingers are when you tap, the larger the trampoline and the higher and further your little pangolin friend will bounce.
It takes some practice before you get the hang of it, but Pangolin’s makers have provided some thoughtful tools to help you. First is extra shots, for those times when you run out of trampolines. And second – and likely to be much more useful – is a swipe-to-restart gesture. This is excellent, because Pangolin is not easy.
On most levels, you can’t see the entire level in one glance, and there’s no way of exploring it while leaving the pangolin waiting. The first time you try a level, you’re exploring it as you go along, discovering its various traps as they appear. To be successful, you need a quick mind and quick fingers.
The visuals are wonderful. Gentle colors, paper-like textures, and thoughtful design of everything including typography, level maps and in-app store. It has a delightful look all of its own.
The app is free, and comes with three training levels and 10 ordinary ones. After that, you have to pay for more levels that come in packs of 40, priced at a dollar each.
I like Pangolin. If you like it, you might end up paying several dollars to play it, but the level packs are fairly priced in my opinion. What’s more, Pangolin is harder than some similar games, which means you’re likely to attempt each level several times – once just to get through it, then again to capture all the stars and gems within in, which in many cases will require some seriously skilful playing.
Source: App Store
