QuickAdvice: Ninjatown: Trees Of Doom!

In Ninjatown: Trees of Doom! you control a single Wee Ninja who wants to impress Ol' Master Ninja by climbing the furthest possible distance up the Trees of Doom. This is no easy task since Mr. Demon's evil minions will go to great lengths to stop your rise to the top.

Venan Entertainment wanted to create a simple yet addictive pick-up-and-play game based on the Ninjatown universe for the iPhone and iPod touch instead of something similar to the much deeper Nintendo DS game, and they most certainly accomplished this in Ninjatown: Trees of Doom! thanks to the adorable characters, artwork, and spot on controls.

Your Wee Ninja is entirely controlled via touch controls. You won't see any accelerometer use here. To climb the two tree trunks, you will need to either jump between them or scale them by crawling ninja-style. Jumping between the two trunks is as simple as tapping on the opposite side of the screen. Tapping quickly will make your Wee Ninja jump low, and tapping and holding will make him jump a tad higher. Climbing is done by simply touching and holding on the side of the screen you are currently on.

Tree branches can be used to slingshot your way past the evil minions or over the many obstacles that are in your way. You can also obtain power-ups such as a flying mustache to quickly speed through large portions of the level without the risk of injury.

Ninjatown is a much more strategic affair when compared to most endless jumping games. It actually almost feels more like a platformer. The game doesn't contain a timer or anything to push you along, so you can calculate each and every move you make, which is actually necessary since you can't climb back down the Trees of Doom to get a better angle on certain obstacles.

Since this is an endless jumping game, the Plus+ integration goes a long way in sustaining replayability with global leaderboards and some fairly difficult awards to obtain.

The only thing that really drags the game down is the lack of game modes. The difficulty ramps up nicely as you climb the Trees of Doom, but once you have obtained that crazy high score you were shooting for, there isn't much else to do. A timed mode or something of that nature would do this one wonders.

At first glance Ninjatown: Trees of Doom! may seem like your everyday jumping game, but it's just not. The colorful artwork and characters coupled with the simple yet amazingly addictive gameplay makes this one stand out amongst the crowd. It's an absolute must-have for casual gaming fans.