Tiki Towers 2: Monkey Republic

If you're going to task a pack of monkeys with building a tower, best keep things simple.

That's the message that should be been scrawled on the workstations of those who made Tiki Towers 2: Monkey Republic – follow up to the quite brilliant Tropical Towers.

No doubt the developer simply wanted to mix things up a bit and expand on an already successful setup to offer fans a reason to part with their cash for a second time.

In the event, Tiki Towers 2: Monkey Republic demonstrates that there's such a thing as pushing an idea too far.

At first glance, Tiki Towers 2: Monkey Republic seems to follow its predecessor's blueprint.

The goal of guiding your gaggle of monkeys from their box on one side of the stage to the 'finish' line on the other by building a series of structures with a set number of bamboo sticks naturally remains.

The controls, thankfully, also hold no surprises, with number keys '2', '4', '6' and '8' on hand to guide your pointer around the screen. Hitting '5' then places a node that, if in range, links up with the rest of the building to form what amounts to a chain of triangles.

It's only when the monkeys are finally let loose that your engineering skills are put to the test, many a tower simply crumbling under their weight.

All that was true in the original. What makes Monkey Republic different is the sheer size of the levels at hand, as well as the slew of objects that you're tasked with picking up along the way.

While the first Tropical Towers was no pushover, it gave room for experimentation and exploration. The design of the stages undoubtedly handed out pointers towards an ideal route, but if you found your own path.

Much of that sense of endeavour has regrettably been lost in Monkey Republic. So far apart are the 'start' and 'finish' lines in some cases – and, just as importantly, so restrictive the number of bamboo sticks on offer – that doing as the game instructs is the only way to play.

Tiki Towers mark II is still a great-looking game - the sequel hasn't lost the sparkling graphics and sound since its last outing - and the excellent physics engine is still intact, meaning it's rare to find yourself blaming the game for a collapsed bridge.

But these are aspects that were also true of the original. Of course, if Progressive Media had failed to make changes Tiki Towers 2: Monkey Republic would have been more or less the same package as its predecessor.

But by fencing off much of the experimentation and thrilling exploration of the original, Tiki Towers 2 ends up a bamboo bridge compared with the original's steel girders.