Pandorum (iPhone)

Dennis Quaid may not be the movie draw he once was, but you know he’ll be able to do the business in space-based sci-fi horror flick like Pandorum.

And the set up of the film enables this thirdperson survival horror tie-in game to get straight to the action.

Two astronauts awake to find themselves among the few survivors of Elysium, a 60,000-strong sleeper ship, travelling to a new world.

Hideous genetic mutations and mental psychosis resulting from prolonged space habitation - a condition called Pandorum - have turned everyone else into maniacs, monsters... basically targets.

You control Corporal Bower, who together with Quaid’s character Lieutenant Payton - you communicate via radio and cutscenes - endeavour to restore power to the ship in order to return home.

Fearing for their lives, as well as fighting the pressures of deep space insanity, you journey through the bowels of the ship.

A virtual analogue stick in the lower-left corner of the screen enables you to move Bower, while a horizontal slider on the right allows you to turn left and right.

Oddly, the analogue stick doesn't function in a true analogue sense; instead, it behaves digitally. Any angled manoeuvring of the stick is rigidly translated as forward, backward, left, and right movement - there are no soft turns or diagonal movement. This gives Bower a clunky feel, his steps shambling forward with each press of the stick.

Better camera controls would have smoothed out jagged movement, but the limitations of the horizontal slider exacerbate the lumbering sensation. Replacing the slider with a full analogue stick or swipe anywhere camera system would be necessary to liberate Pandorum from the curse of its clumsy controls.

Modifying the basic controls would also have a positive impact on targeting, which in its current dysfunctional state is enough to drive you mad with frustration. Tapping the screen instructs Bower to lock onto a selected enemy, though frequent targeting failures force you to tap repeatedly in order to get a successful lock.

This is due in part to the interface obscuring sections of the screen.

To be honest, the game would be better off dropping manual targeting altogether in favour of auto-targeting whenever an enemy appears. Not only would it eliminate targeting troubles, but it would allow you to switch targets (via a tap of the screen to rotate through visible targets, for example) that currently doesn't exist.

What's interesting though is how Pandorum recognises the impact of its messy control scheme.

Since enemy confrontations almost always result in Bower taking damage because the clunky controls make evading and targeting difficult, the game provides a generous number of first aid kits and food for replenishing lost health. In this way, it becomes playable because it balances its own deficiencies.

Similarly, insanity inhibitor vials litter the decks of Elysium.

These are to used to reduce Bower's insanity gauge, which naturally tracks his grip on reality. Every enemy he sees fills the gauge a bit and once it fills, he dies. It's not clear how, exactly, death ensues from insanity, but you're forced to manage his mental wellness in concert with his physical health.

As the insanity gauge fills, twisted images flash on the screen to mimic hallucinations. Sadly these are not in the least frightening. Instead, they're annoying and do more to complicate combat by blocking your view than contribute to the game's creepy vibe.

Still, despite its flaws, Pandorum offers entertainment.

Whether it's the intriguing story that hooks you in or the way its imperfect controls recall memories of ambling through Resident Evil, there's something oddly enjoyable about it.

The monsters also are grotesque enough that you’ll want to take them out with the variety of provided weapons. These ranges from melee blunt and sharp objects to pistols, shotguns, electric rifles and mines. There’s plenty of blood splashed around too.

The inclusion of extra features such as collectible Elysium tokens, journals divulging the ship's history, a progress sharing feature, and online leaderboards ensure the game ticks many feature bulletpoints.

But Pandorum possesses too many flaws - notably in terms of its controls - to earn a wide recommendation. Unless you’re a real hardcore fan of sci-fi, horror and/or Dennis Quaid movies, this is a space trip too far.