Throwing Stars Fly In Flick Ninja
Flick Ninja ($0.99) by Tobytek tests your ninjutsu skills and patience.
The game shows a bamboo background with a lone throwing star at the bottom of the screen. You’ll need to flick the star toward magic lanterns, firecrackers, and other objects in order to score points.
Once the star is set on its way you can only watch as it ricochets off the bamboo walls. Hitting three or more objects in a row results in a combo, while wipeouts (acing the level) are for the most skilled ninjas.
While the game is simple enough, the physics involved with it are maddening. For starters, you can only play in portrait mode, which means you have a narrow board to work with.
Throwing the star at a bad angle (which is pretty common) just makes it bounce off the walls in a giant rectangular formation. As long as no objects lie in this trajectory, you’ve wasted a star.
Naturally, the star loses momentum after bouncing around for a while. However, a couple of times before my star fully waned, it timed out just before hitting an object. I finally realized that the best way to hit objects is flicking the star at a horizontal angle.
The game offers four different modes: just for fun (unlimited stars), tao time trial (90 seconds to make a high score), bamboo bushido (bamboo obstacles get in the way), and way of the star (start with only three stars).
This is a fair game to play, though it tried my patience with how the star behaved. Maybe I’m just a pirate.
