Overview
Dr. Awesome is an arcade-style game that mixes the arcade/mini game genre with something less common - the dramatic adventure/text genre. The gameplay is essentially the same mini game - tilt your phone to draw a line and isolate viruses - repeated ad nauseam. However, the nausea is relieved by the absurdly funny dialogue and over-dramatic cartoon visual style.
Features
- Same Old Tilt Controls, Unique setting
Tilting your iPhone to move a ball around the screen has been going on since the App Store was established, but Dr. Awesome’s clever setup puts a new spin on an old game mechanic.
- Suitably Cheesy Cartoon Graphics
The drawings of doctors and nurses in all kinds of hyperdramatic poses form a great synergy with the enthusiastic dialog to create a feel similar to games like Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney. This helps keep the experience fresh.
Dr. Awesome uses names from your contact list to serve as patients in-game. This was hilarious, as my very first patient was my landlady. Maybe I can get my rent reduced for saving her life...
Breakdown
The Good:
Dr. Awesome reminds me of a game I used to play on my PC called JezzBall. The goal was to create walls to eliminate parts of the playing field and isolate the balls that were bouncing around the screen. The gameplay is essentially the same here, with some things added for flavor. Viruses shoot out bolts that’ll cost you time, harmful bacteria will do the same if you run into them, and the viruses actually seem to go for you while you’re making a cut.
The game felt like it required a little strategy - deciding when and where to cut out some of the cell, whether to make a risky large cut or several smaller ones, and so on. Adapting to the virus’s movement was a little thrilling, and made this feel kind of like a game of cat and mouse - whether you were the cat or the mouse changed from second to second. The game was even moderately challenging, which I always enjoy.
The thematic nature of Dr. Awesome, though a bit cheesy, actually did create a sense of being a doctor. Playing the surgery game felt like doing doing surgery - at least in the sense that in my mind I referred to my actions as “making cuts” or “isolating the virus”. This added a lot to the fun of the game, and ngmoco deserves props for taking a simplistic game and making it an experience.
The Bad:
While almost everything ran smoothly in this game, it did fare poorly when coming back from being paused with the iPhone’s lock button. The tilt controls seemed not to work at all! This was easily remedied by locking and unlocking the phone again but it was definitely annoying, and caused me to lose more than one patient.
Verdict
For only a dollar, this is a pretty entertaining little game. It’s got a lot of personality and will provide a few laughs. Like most inexpensive games, the fun won’t last forever. However, UNlike most inexpensive games, Dr. Awesome is actually kind of awesome. It looks good, plays well, and reads like an episode of some ridiculous medical soap opera. Grab it if you like those, or JezzBall, or just good games.
