FishCraft is an Indie game for the Xbox 360 marketplace developed by Torque and Frozensoft. Following in the footsteps of the popular mobile game Angry Birds, FishCraft is a physics puzzle game that involves firing fish out of cannons in order to defeat fortified cats. This game is quite the little time-passer featuring 63 levels. If you can get past the blatant copy-pasting of game mechanics, you will have fun.
FishCraft instantly sets the mood that you should expect in this game by starting up with epic music that would be at home in any trailer for an action packed summer blockbuster or the log-in screen to your favorite MMORPG. I could not help but laugh at the combination of such silly artwork and such serious music and this feeling only persisted when the game's story was introduced. The main motivation of this game is that the cats are eating all of your fish friends. So as a fish yourself, what can you do to avenge you lost friends? The answer FishCraft provides is to fire oneself from a cannon in order to defeat the mighty fortresses of the cats. The game gives you a cannon with the ability to change force and angle of fire. It also gives you a dotted line to show where your previous shots went.
The game features several different kinds of fish ammo with different abilities. The ones I have encountered are red plain fish that act as basic cannon balls, yellow missile fish which after pressing the action button fire straight, black bomb fish which roll and than explode with action button, blue bomber fish which rocket forward and drop bombs with the press of the action button and finally fish bowl bombs which drop multiple fish after exploding. Although you can never truly select which ammo you want to use at a given time - which can be annoying - the game does offer an interesting feature. You can fire as many shots as you have as fast as you want simply by pressing the fire button over and over. This allows for interesting combos or just the ability to overwhelm the enemy fortress via a blitz of fish.
The gameplay itself is pretty fun and interesting. Some of the puzzles are a bit clunky. One example from an early level is where you have to smash a blue pole in order to drop bombs on cats inside an indestructible fortress. It requires two hits to destroy but really gives no indication of whether you hit it or not. This game is just, in some cases, trial and error. Another issue I had was with the speed of the game. I found myself rather annoyed with the loading speed between screens of the game and resets. Finally, I had some minor issues with audio cutting out when the cannons were firing.
If you can move beyond these small problems, the game’s 63 levels can be a fun time waster. If you like silly, simple physics puzzles on the Xbox 360 then you can not do much better for now. A warning to cat apologists out there: you may want to steer clear of this game or else you will be in for lots of cat death. However, I’m sure you can occupy yourselves talking with pig fans out there.
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Graphics |
8.5 |
Cool backgrounds and interesting fish designs. Game is not bad to look at. Not beautiful either. |
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Audio |
7.0 |
Epic music is funny considering the subject matter of the game. I had a few audio issues though. |
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Single Player |
8.5 |
Fun and interesting physics puzzles which are quick to play through. A few of them may be a bit annoying. |
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Multiplayer |
N/A |
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Replay |
7.0 |
I guess replay could be fun, but much of the ‘pick up and play on the go’ element of Angry Birds is missing from this console title. The main replay will come with the next two episodes that are not unlocked yet. |
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Overall |
7.5 |
FishCraft will entertain you for a while with its 63 levels and 5 different ammo types, but it is by no means a masterpiece of gaming. Also, if you are not a fan of rehashed mechanics or patient enough for the trial and error element of the puzzles, stay away. |
