We're always fans of well designed, easy to play (but tough to master) games, and Roller Rally - Snake Pass certainly fits the bill. Recently released, Roller Rally takes downhill roller skate racing and puts a fun cartoon twist that makes it a joy to play. Good characters, sound and gameplay all add to the appeal of this title.
We want to take a little time to highlight the features of this game, so stick around after the break and check it out.
The gameplay of Roller Rally is super simple, with two different control choices. You can choose between "one touch mode" where you tap a button to jump, tap and hold to spin and "advanced mode" where you use your right thumb to jump, your left to spin forward or backwards. The controls and the way you use them remind me a lot of Granny Smith, which has been hugely popular. Other than controls, there are simple settings to toggle sounds and reset the game from the main menu -- be careful of that trash can icon, there's no confirmation dialog when it deletes the game!
Getting past the main menu, the game introduces you to four fun characters -- Iko Disko, Arnie Barnacle, Olaf Blackaxe and Gert Hammerback -- that you can eventually unlock and choose from. Each one has its own distinct personality and represents a different country of origin. You start off with only Iko Disko unlocked, and race every round against the other three characters. The levels are fun with plenty of jumps and tricks required to pass them. Naturally, there are coins and extra pickups to hit a top score, but they often take you off of the fastest path to get them.
In order to reach the highest score possible you need to finish in first place of the four players (on top of collecting coins), which adds a challenging aspect. High scores can be recorded locally or added to online leaderboards by way of the Swarm, an online gaming platform (similar to OpenFeint). You can log in to a Swarm account to set it up, but it's nice that a login isn't required to play the game if you'd prefer to just keep it local.
The levels start up at the top of a mountain, and as you progress through you move farther and farther down. As you progress through, you'll eventually unlock the other characters and can choose to play as them instead of Iko Disko if you choose. The levels naturally get harder as you move farther down the mountain, unlocking one at a time once you finish the previous level. The styling and surroundings of the levels change with the altitude, from snow and icicles at the top to a town and houses when you're off the slopes.
I had a great time playing this game because it is easy to just mess around and play while still getting through the levels, but if you're interested in perfecting them it can take some time. You can casually play and make it through getting second or third place every round, but you can always go back later to rack up more points and actually unlock things. It makes the game feel like it has even more gameplay in it than at first glance, which is already quite a bit.
Roller Rally - Snake Pass is a fun and well designed game that won't disappoint. And at just $1.09 for a full-featured and ad-free version, it's a pretty darn great deal as well. You can check it out at the Play Store link at the top of this post.
