Craneballs adds depth to physics flingers in Fish Heroes

There have been plenty of 2D games based on Angry Birds. It could be argued Angry Birds is one of them.

However, until recently, there weren't too many 3D games based on Angry Birds.

Now there's two.

Wicked Witches' Catapult King (published by Chillingo), came out a week ago, but I know Craneballs' Fish Heroes has prior claim because I played a version ten months ago.

Quite what the developer has been doing in the meantime I do not know, but the game is finally out.

Despite switching 2D to 3D, birds to fish, and pigs to sharks, the core gameplay is similar to Angry Birds.

You have to fire the various types of fish - seven in total - to knock over the various sharks, which are positioned on and within not very secure undersea constructions.

In this manner, it's a physics trajectory game, but the 3D nature makes it different.

You can rotate each level, albeit in 2 dimensions, combining the power icon at the bottom of the screen and the aiming dot to ensure you target the right spot with your fish.

Actually, one of the interesting elements of the game is that the aiming dot means you hardly ever miss your target, making Fish Heroes more about tactical thinking in terms of what happens when you knock that shark or that pillar over.

But there are also some twitch elements, such as a puffer fish you have to expand at the correct moment by tapping the screen, or the herring ammo that splits into four, providing an area weapon.

Perhaps the nicest thing about the game, however, is the humorous art style, which mixes cuboid fish with bright undersea colours and attractive atmospheric animations.

Fish Heroes is a universal release for iPad and iPhone and costs 99c, €0.79 or 69p.

It comes with 100 levels - another 25 will arrive soon - and you can buy earthquake smartbombs as in-app purchases, which you trigger by shaking your device to knock everything over. You can also spend $4.99 to unlock all levels immediately.

Fish Heroes is coming to Android and the Mac App Store in July.

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