A game's title doesn't need to convey a great deal of meaning or even make much sense, but a well-considered name does both these things. HupplePupple is the sort of word men don't even like to say. It's far too Harry Potter, as though you're going to be scolded by Head Master Dumbledore for once again breaking school rules tinkering with contraband.
HupplePupple by any other name would be as sweet, nonetheless. Despite the questionable name, this really isn't a bad puzzle game at all. It's one of the many App Store dwellers that's in need of updates and has that amateurish yet charming, home-made aroma about it, but still pans out pleasantly.
Your goal is to guide a wandering character through various maps without letting them fall off the edges. It's like a twisted version of Pac-Man where guidance means everything and chomping on collectible hearts is a secondary concern.
Setting your non-Pac-Man off in a direction means he doesn't stop until he hits a wall (with a satisfying squelch), so it takes a bit of mental dexterity to figure out where to send him next to gather up all the hearts strewn about the level and finish up alongside Ms non-Pac-Man.
Tapping the touchscreen allows you to tilt the map. Touch a corner and the map tilts in the corresponding direction, which naturally moves your character. You wouldn't be the first to think accelerometer controls are a perfect fit here. Unfortunately, the dull sensitivity and extremes of movement the motion-sensing controls require mean you either don't move without practically shaking the handset, or the display's turned so far away you can't see what's going on.
There's no particular shortage of levels, considering you're back to the first round each time you fail to meet the time limit, but that feels to be in the spirit of this casual game's remit. A few instructions would have been nice to kick things off, too, but HupplePupple is one of the many iPhone games that seems to think it doesn't need to explain itself.
With refined controls, a wider selection of grating three second looped-tunes, and a lot more imagination put into the graphics this would hold up as a decent and addictive puzzler. But there's a sense that the developer, after working out a great gaming concept, rushed it to the App Store before refining the niceties. A couple of sincere updates and this could have landed itself an extra point or two.
As it is, HupplePupple is still sweetly enjoyable, though the slapdash quality means it's definitely not going to win any awards.
HupplePupple
With a bit more effort in most every department, this obscurely titled game could have made a lot more of itself
Spanner Spencer
Yes. Spanner's his real name, and he's already heard that joke you just thought of. Although Spanner's not very good, he's quite fast, and that seems to be enough to keep him in a regular supply of free games and away from the depressing world of real work.