By Gary Kearney
Since you are reading this I'm going to go out on a limb and guess that you
have either an iPhone or iPod touch (and if not, why are you reading this??). I
will further amaze you with my psychic abilities by suggesting that you have
also spent some time untangling the little white earphones that come along with
the Apple devices previously mentioned. I'm right aren't I? Well it seems that
the people over at Spoonjuice have also had their fair share of untangling wires
because they made a game called The Plateau that kind of uses that basic idea.
Strange sounding? Sure. Entertaining? Read on...
We've all spent too much time untangling a bunch of wires and cords, but The
Plateau takes the frustration of untangling lines and makes it fun...most of the
time. The Plateau is a fairly simple concept. On screen there are several orbs.
Each of these orbs has two or more lines that lead to other orbs. The goal is to
arrange the orbs so that no lines cross. When all the lines are clean and not
crossing over another line the level is over and you move on to the next
level/puzzle. Like I said, simple concept but it turns out an addicting one
also.
It takes several levels to understand what's happening and there really isn't
much in the way of instructions. When a level begins the orbs are all scattered
about and often times there are two or three orbs on top of each other that you
won't noticed until you move one. Sometimes an orb will change color and if you
touch it during this period you get a bonus, except don't touch a black orb as
that will lose some points...but don't worry it will only stay black for a few
moments. There were some orb colors that I did figure out. For instance, green
orbs meant that that orb has none of its lines crossing with any other lines.
However, that doesn't necessary mean that is where the orb will ultimately end
up. Red orbs meant that more than one line from that orb was crossing another
line and gold orbs meant that one line is still crossing.
There are two game modes, Challenge and Arcade with each having 50 levels.
The Arcade mode is based on a time limit and you have to quickly solve the
puzzle before time runs out. The Challenge mode you can take your time. There is
a scoring system in the Challenge mode, but honestly I never figured it out but
that didn't bother me since I was more interested in solving the puzzle than
scoring points. It was very helpful that the game saves your progress in both
modes and you can submit your scores.
Graphics are simple with just some colored orbs and lines with a space
background. After every ten levels the background image changes. Some of the
backgrounds can be a little distracting and it can make tracing the path of a
line a little more difficult. The sound and music fit the game perfectly with a
kind of spacey electronic vibe going on. You do get to understand the goal and
how to play there are times when you will move an orb and suddenly solve the
puzzle without really meaning to.
The Plateau is currently priced at $4.99 which I feel is just a little too
much; $2.99 or less would have made this a done deal.
Final Rating: 87%
