My thumbs hurt
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If you have been living under a rock for the past week or so then you might not be aware of the new IOS game Feer. This will be a review of the game along with my personal thoughts. Of course there will be a giveaway for the game as well, check the bottom of the post to get entered into the drawing. There will also be a link at the bottom to check out a livestream from earlier today.
Game Information
Developer: Hansjoerg Mikesch
Platform: IOS(now), Android(November)
Cost: $2.99 in the app store
Languages: English & German
Link: Feer in the app store
Quick Description: Endless runner, avoid zombies from the sides, jump the reaching hands, and duck the ravens. Collect fairy lights and special power-ups and run as far as possible.
From the developer
The first audio endless runner game. Only the ones with the best ears survive in this dark and foggy world and can save the fairies.
simple TOUCH interface to interact
multiple MISSIONs let the challenge never end
fascinating RETROstyle Graphics
immersive 3D SOUND
No ADS, No In-App purchase, FULL ENDLESS GAME
Fully accessible with VoiceOver, incl. tutorial and menu
Getting started with the game
The first issue I had was finding the dang thing in the app store. Just searching for “Feer” resulted in a bunch of stuff I didn’t want. I heard someone say it was best to search the developer’s name so I searched “Hansjoerg Mikesch” next and it popped right up. After some wrestling with the app store and forgetting my password I finally managed to buy the game and get it downloaded. Without headphones plugged in I didn’t hear anything at all when I launched the game so I had to rummage around until I found a cord to plug my phone into my headset, after this all was good to go and I was ready to start playing.
When you start out you are in a tutorial mode to help you get use to the controls and different sounds in the game. They are pretty straight forward. You swipe left to move left, right to move right, up to jump and down to perform a slide on the ground. The main point of the game is to switch between the three lanes avoiding getting eaten by zombies while jumping over hands popping up in the ground and sliding under ravens swooping down to peck your eyes out. Your character runs forward automatically so you need to only worry about moving right, left, up and down. There are fairy lights you’ll hear as you run which you need to collect by running over them, these count as lights which can be used to skip quests. You also win points for each run depending on how long you last each time. The game is achievement based meaning you level up every time you complete a group of three quests. These might be anything from get past 10 zombies, collect 100 fairies, jump in the left lanes 10 times, or anything else you can think of. Your scores are multiplied by your current level so the more quests you complete the higher your level and the more points you get per run.
There are also the special power-ups which make a different noise than the fairies. These will give you a shield that will protect you from one zombie hit, super speed which makes you invincible, a double fairy bonus, and a weapon you can use to kill the zombies. More on these power-ups below.
One thing that was not pointed out anywhere is that if you turn off voice over you will have the game read the info to you along with reading the buttons. It may be just in my head but I believe with voice over off the game is a tad bit more responsive. You can try it yourself and see if you notice the same thing.
The game play
Overall the game is extremely simple and quite easy to get used to. As you run you speed up and this does make sure it gets more difficult as you progress in each round. As I moved through the levels I found the quests weren’t getting more difficult, they were just changing. By round 10 they were all pretty much the same just different stuff. Slide 5 times instead of jump, switch 50 lanes instead of 20, but nothing to really make it challenging. The only thing for challenge was to try to beat your own personal high scores, but even this is quite easy since your level multiplies your score. Each time you level the next run will be higher even if you die at the same exact point every time so there wasn’t much there to challenge me either.
After progressing past level 12 it starts to get a little bit more difficult with the quests, but in a collective way, not a per run way. The number are getting higher, but they are added up over all runs, not just one run. For example it can say get past 100 zombies, but that only means do 10 runs and pass 10 each time, not pass 100 zombies without dying. The quests will take longer but it doesn’t mean they are more difficult which is a bit of a letdown. AT this point my thoughts are that I’m just being eased into the game very slowly and that it’ll pick up as I keep leveling.
It is worth mentioning at this point that even though I’m not impressed with the difficulty of the game I’m still playing it quite a bit. I couldn’t tell you why, maybe just out of hope for it getting to be more of a challenge, or maybe I’m a bit touched in the head. Either way there is something to this because I’m still running around trying to progress in the game even with the above complaints.
When the game gets challenging.
Written as I progress through the game:
Well to be honest I haven’t reached this point yet. I can’t even tell if there are more zombies in each run as you level or not. All the quests are collective as you level, not many of them are do X in a single run. AT level 11 there is one semi-challenging quest and again at level 21. Aside from that everything is staying with the collective theme which doesn’t allow for much of a challenge. If I can complete something in 10 turns with a low score then it isn’t very difficult, just time consuming. On top of that even past level 20 I’m still getting the silly simple quests like jump 10 times in the left lane. This I would expect early on but not as I progress through the game. If the quests are just random then it is more frustrating than I originally thought, but I can’t tell if they are or not.
What is even more frustrating is the quests which are based on luck. When I have to find two specific types of power-ups it really peeves me. There is no way to get these accept by playing over and over until you get lucky and find the correct ones. Again this is just making the quests take more time, not be more difficult. I want a challenge, not time wasting quests, but so far there hasn’t been much of it. In 25 levels I’ve had 2 quests out of 75 that were even slightly challenging. This isn’t what I’m personally looking for, but maybe it is good for others.
After level 30 I’m finally getting into some quests that are more difficult of the single run type. There are some in total quests still but even these are getting more difficult due to the increasing numbers. I don’t know how many quests there are, but if it goes on like this it will at least give a challenge as you play through.
Biggest complaints
The one thing that has bothered me more than anything is the slight sound differences between the different power-ups. It has taken me about 25 levels to get to know the difference between them completely. It is quite subtle and for awhile I didn’t know what each one was after picking it up. You are only told what each one is once in the tutorial mode at the start and this wasn’t enough for me.
The second really big annoyance is that this game doesn’t work with a keyboard. My Corsair wireless is paired with my phone but even after switching it to Bluetooth it won’t work with the game. I have no clue why this is but I find it very annoying. I seem to have a hell of a time swiping straight down for sliding and will find myself dying from ravens even after three failed down swipes. The hope was to use my keyboard to fix this problem, but it is a complete no go as it doesn’t work at all.
I’ve also found it quite annoying that I can’t put my phone in portrait mode for playing. This would allow for just a tad bit more comfort when swiping with my thumb, but it is a no go, you are stuck in landscape. I know I could just rest my phone flat and use a finger but it just doesn’t feel right no matter how much I do it.
Conclusion
Overall I’m impressed with the sounds and simple yet fun little game. I am not a fan personally of how it progresses through levels as it is made way too easy until you spend a lot of time leveling by completing silly quests. I realize each person will have a different experience with the game depending on how quick they pick it up. It is easy to download and jump right in, but once you get a little bit of skill the first 30 levels are quite boring and repetitive. After this there is at least a little bit of challenge involved, but still not quite as much as I’d like. Overall it is a good little game and for the price you can’t really complain especially if it keeps leveling into infinity. At some point I’m hoping it will pass even the best player’s skill level giving everyone a challenge. The issue for me is just how long it might take to get there.
Rating
objectively: 8.5/10
Subjectively: 6.5/10
Check out the BSG Feer live stream
Check out Liam’s live stream of Feer
Feer Giveaway
All you need to do is click the share to twitter link at the top of the post and share it within 24 hours of this post’s publish time. If you do that you’ll be entered into the drawing to win a copy of the game.