Shadowgun:Deadzone

Don't think just shoot!

Platform: Android also available on ios and pc
Genre: 3rd person shooter

Developer: Madfinger

What's it all about?

It's a 3rd person view online shooter made by the same people who made Dead Trigger. Think gears of war and you're pretty much there. In other words run, cover, roll and shoot , nice and simple. 

Will you be so lucky?

The first 30 minutes

After a lengthy loading time I'm greeted to some scifi style upbeat music and a messy and I mean messy looking menu screen. Luckily a training pop up on screen points out what's what.

Not long after I'm thrown straight into an online battle, no training here, just learn the controls and feel for it on the job. Pleasantly surprised at how quickly it connects to a game. I must say at this point I'm playing using my ipega controller (check out my previous post for the review).

So running and shooting simple, not so sure about this jumping into cover though, basically it works but not every time. Doesn't matter, I'm having too much fun anyway blasting everything in sight!

Game over and I come in fourth out of 8 people. Not bad for the first try. Next, is an introduction to the shop (freeium) weapons, upgrades all here. But I'll save my cash for something bigger, right now I just want to jump straight in again.

What I thought

Fun and free is what I can say. The game looks and runs great. Lots of weapons and upgrades to keep things interesting. However it does have it's flaws.

Lag, the bane of every online gamer. While in a one on one, many times did my opponent move like a ghost, almost naturally. A couple of times I would be shooting one player and nothing was registering. I don't know if it was my connection or what (I have a good speed on wifi) but it was very frustrating.

Then there is the controls or rather the feel of it. Going in to cover is not the smoothest of transitions and sometimes I was left standing like a lemon while trying to hide. In the end I just gave up with cover altogether. Next is rolling, if you have ever played gears of war (or any 3rd person for that matter) it is the most useful tactic you can do in terms of countering your enemy. In this game however it just feels clunky and slow, I felt open every time I used it, in the end I just abandoned it also.

You aren't going to do much from there

Despite those kinds of major flaws its still fun. And the various weapons, shotguns, assault rifles, energy and sniper keeps things ticking over. But to get these weapons and upgrades you need money, at the beginning its easy to save, but later on it will get hard as powerful weapons become so expensive, sound familiar? That's where the freeium comes into play. The game is free but the developers got to make money somewhere. However I think its still possible to get by without spending anything, just be prepared to feel underpowered in the higher ranks. 

Conclusion

Would I recommend it? Yes if you like a fun free online shooter. If I had paid for it I would have felt very disappointed as the game feels unfinished. Then there is the issue of hackers and cheaters, I'm not sure if I encountered any, but it would explain some of the strange things I saw.

Overall a good fun game and it's free, but possibly short lived as something better is bound to come along. Maybe the developers might release an update to iron out its rough edges? See you on the battlefield.

iPega Bluetooth Controller 9025

Game Controller for Android and iPhone 

Model Name: iPega 9025
Price: £22 (at the time)

First thoughts

Retro gaming, reliving those days of gaming when you had all the time in the world. As Android phones have got more and more powerful so to has the games and emulators now running smooth thanks to the tech savvy programmers. 

But there is one thing that gets in the way, fingers and thumbs. Lets face it playing on a touchscreen device just isn't the same as having a controller in your hand. Granted there are some touchscreen games that work better that way. And there is some developers who have made some very good touchscreen control with first and third person view genres, dead trigger comes straight to mind. 

Controllers for phones haven't been too great recently, either built badly, sketchy connectivity or just a lack of support. Some of the problems is down to Android being so open source. 

Then came the iPega a not so big and well known company unlike Moga (probably the most well known controller at the moment). But is it any good? 

The Test

First thing I instantly notice is how small and light this thing is. With a built in rechargeable battery I was beginning to wonder if they forgot to put it in there. Inside the box is the USB charging cable, a badly written instruction manual (more on that in a bit) and the controller itself. 

The feel of the controller is nice on the hands. Two analogue sticks have a rubbery indent to them and also click, that's your L3 and R3 buttons sorted. D-pad is present small but finely placed. Start and select buttons near the top. Media buttons at the bottom, (volume, play pause etc). Four action buttons perfectly placed, and feel quite high quality similar to the glassy feel of the Xbox controller. Two shoulder buttons that are a little fiddly to press. Lastly the two L2 and R2 buttons are right underneath, like at the back. That will take some getting used to. At the top of the controller is the phone holder. Conveniently tucked inside, it stretches out under a spring mechanism, that sounds a bit squeaky, dare I say it, a little flimsy sounding. 

The nice thing with this is it can be used while charging. iPega boast that the controller has 20hour play time from a full charge which takes about 3-4 hours. So onto the fun part, connectivity. 

I must admit I was prepared for a very frustrating day of just trying to connect to my phone. The instruction leaflet didn't fill me with much hope. It tells you how to activate the different connection modes but doesn't explain what they are for. Basically when it's off, you press the "X" button then the "Home" button to activate gamepad mode. The same for the other modes, keyboard mode, SPP mode and iCade mode. That's all it had to say, but instead it repeats itself in bad English on how to switch on the other modes, and like I said no explanation as what they are. With that said, I was pleasantly surprised to see it connected so quickly and easily. Half the battle done it was time to play.

First up was a racing game from the play store, Asphalt 8. On loading the game says it has detected a controller, good sign. I'm then taken to a choose controller layout. From there I can now use the controller in the menu but, the highlighter moves all over the place, a tad too sensitive I think, not so good sign. Thank goodness I can still use the touchscreen to choose races. Once in the game and it feels perfect. Small movements and big movements from the sticks correspond exactly to the car in the game. Using the action buttons for brake and boost all working perfect, very happy indeed.

Next up emulators, games that were made to be played on a console with a controller. So far I have tested Fpse (ps1), Ppsspp (PSP) and SuperN64. And there is not much to say other then it works perfect. I did very occasionally get a strange thing with the PSP that the directional stick didn't respond, but a reset solved that.

Conclusion

After some heavy use I found that it did live up to expectations and the fact that you can use the micro USB for charging and use it while charging is very convenient. I did however get some cramping in my hands and fingers but that is to be expected as it is designed to be portable, however I was playing for a long time so probably my fault.

Just under my middle fingers lies the L2 and R2 buttons

Finding compatible games via Google Play is a bit difficult, some games don't support external controllers where you think that they should (some first person view games for example) and some dont work as expected. But that is down to the developers. I'm planning in the future to add the games I have tried and whether they work as intended.

I'm still a little worried about the holder breaking one day, but so far it hasn't so maybe it's just my imagination? Plus I've been bringing it with me pretty much everywhere, at work, on the bus sometimes even pushed into a jacket pocket when not in use, so it seems quite sturdy.

Overall I'm very happy with it, and would defiantly recommend it, especially for the price which is way cheaper then the Moga controller. A fine piece of kit for any gamer on the go or who just wants to relieve the glory days of games gone by.