Zapper: A Boring Game about a Cricket

Zapper: One Lousy Adventure (2 out of 5)

The story of Zapper is simple, a cricket with attitude who goes through eighteen level to save his brother from one big bad bird, who is being a menace to the crickets. Technically, the premise of Zapper is a premise that had been seen a thousand of times in video games, the bad guy who kidnaps a weaker individual who could be a female or a male and then the hero who is in a quest to save his or her loved one. So, it is just like every other game out there with this same base story line - and you won’t get anything new here.

Breaking the fourth wall, when I played Zapper for the very first time I thought it was a rip-off of Super Mario Bros and Gex. Why do I say a rip-off between those two games? Well that would be because all the jumping actions are so similar to the Mario Games, but the graphics where similar to the Gex series. And now the game is going to be a port in the X-Box console, but I don’t how a game this terrible is going to be a port in a console as popular as the X-Box.

Gameplay (1 out of 5)

The gameplay is the worst asset of this game, as it is really frustrating from the controllers to the graphics and to the sounds. The basic tutorial of understanding the controllers is not worth it, because as you will progress in the game, the controllers are more difficult to control in ice or fire levels. But, then again, they are problematic in almost every level.

The graphics are so-so, if I have to rate them I would say they are a 3. They reminded me a lot of Gex, simple polygonal graphics that aren’t charming to the eye, which makes them look dirty or pixilated, almost everywhere in the game. When you are playing the game, you feel more like you are testing a beta game rather than playing the actual product. Which makes me thing that the production must have been rushed and there were so many details that were left out that would have made this game so much better all around.

If I have to rate the sound of the game, I would say is a big 1. And, here is why: the music is repetitive, (you will hear almost the same tunes with a slight variation over the 18 levels), which will make you very frustrated hearing the same tunes over and over to the point that you will end up turning off the volume and listening to your IPod, and that even improves the overall game experience.

Overall (2 out of 5)

Overall, this game is below average, if you are an experienced gamer don’t play it you will waste your time from the start to end. You won’t discover anything good or exciting, and not even the X-Box port will promise anything new to the Zapper Universe. The overall rating that I give to Zapper is 2, because of the poor gameplay and low standards in production.

I recommend going and playing other games rather than this, and don’t waste your money on acquiring a boring game like Zapper