Expert’s Rating
Pros
Cons
Our Verdict
Although many Mac user who play games may be more familiar with MacPlay ’s Luxor or Big Fish Games ’ Atlantis , the primogenitor of many of these marble - matching plot is Zuma , developed byPopCap Games . PopCap has create a edition to run on the iPod , and it ’s okay , though some of the limitations of the iPod start to show through .
Zuma utilise a faintly Mesoamerican theme — like some ancient artifacts you ’d find in a ruin Mayan or Aztec temple . You control a stone frog idol that has a dark-skinned marble in its backtalk . Surrounding the toad is a twist , grooved stone course . On that data track come along a chain of colored marbles , set out from offscreen and progress to a golden skull . Your goal is to make that marble chain disappear before it achieve the golden skull by shooting the marble from the Lucy Stone frog ’s mouth into the chain , oppose three or more marble of the same colour .
To do that , the gold frog can rotate 360 degrees — you simply swivel the frog using the click rack . You shoot by pressing the click bike ’s Select key . you’re able to also swop the color of the marble by pressing the dissipated forward or rewind keystone . Although three marbles of the same color are all you need to make a match , you ’ll get bigger bonuses if the chains are longer — like - color ball can make chain reactions when they touch as well , so if you destroy a serial publication of red balls in between two blocks of yellow , blam , they ’ll disappear as well . A progress bar at the top of the screen shows you how far to go in that level .
Two or more blowup triggered by firing a single ball net you points in Zuma , which also lets you collect tycoon - ups like a Backwards glob .
You ’ll get points for combo — two or more blowup because of firing a single musket ball — and you may collect powerfulness - ups by explode limited balls that appear in the string , such as “ Accuracy , ” which gives you a special aiming beam in and increased dismiss upper , “ Backwards , ” which tramp the range back up the track a mo , “ Bomb , ” which blasts everything in its way of life , and “ Slowdown , ” which makes the chain slow up down . you’re able to shoot golden coin for extra points .
Zuma has the mountain range of options I ’ve see in theotheriPodgamesI’ve reviewed , include the ability to economise a game in progression ( ready to hand if you ’re just noodling with your iPod during the cockcrow commute or in between meetings ) , saving high score and so on . It also has the power to play your iPod ’s music rather than playing the in - game music — all you need to do is start an record album or play list before you start roleplay , and Zuma will defer to your extract . you could also adjust brightness and sound effect horizontal surface . adjust brightness , in picky , can have a fundamental outcome on the iPod ’s electric battery life , it seems .
Zuma requires a fair grade of precision in edict to aim the gemstone frog at the range of mountains of colored balls . habituate to the game and other standardized titles from the Mac , I arrive quite frustrated with misaligned stroke that did n’t head the way of life that I expected , partly because of the imprecision of aiming with my thumb and part because of the sizing of the iPod ’s screen .
It ’s possible to compensate for that a bit by using the crest of your finger rather than your pollex to rotate the toad using the click wheel , but it ’s also a less natural movement to do that and strike the prize clit — Zuma ’s really optimize for the nimble movement of a computer mouse and click of a mouse button instead . To this death , I just do n’t think that Zuma hold a corking conversion for the iPod , unless your thumbs are a lot more dextrous than mine .
The lowdown
Zuma ’s another bona fide classic that ’s encounter its room to the iPod , but imprecise draw a bead on and the iPod ’s diminutive screen mar the game play to the item of thwarting .
