Game Reviews

Chasers review - Just another endless runner?

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iOS
| Chasers
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Chasers review - Just another endless runner?
|
iOS
| Chasers

It's hard to imagine a less inspiring genre on mobile than the third person endless runner. We've seen so many iterations on the formula that the idea of seeing anything new is pretty much incomprehensible.

So what we get are games like Chasers, which takes ideas from a bunch of older games and turns them into what can only be described as one of the least inspiring experiences the App Store has seen for a while.

Sure it's polished, and there's nothing mechanically wrong with it. But if you've spent any time with an over-the-shoulder runner in the last five years then there's no point whatsoever picking this one up.

The runs

The game sees you pelting along after a series of thieves in a cartoony middle age castle setting. Swipe left and right to change to one of the three lanes on offer.

Swipe down and you'll skid under an obstacle, swipe up and you'll jump over things. Tap on the screen and you'll throw a rock at one of the robbers you're chasing. But your rocks are limited.

And that's pretty much it. It's Temple Run, it's Subway Surfers, it's a huge list of other games that we've all played over the years and are pretty tired of at this point.

There's a tutorial, but quite frankly you're not going to pay any attention to it. Because one look at the game and you know exactly what you're supposed to be doing.

There are a few very small twists here and there, but nothing that really changes the underlying shape of what's happening. The scenery shifts and boxes get dropped, but you're still just swiping, swiping, swiping until you're bored.

And you'll get bored quickly. Because this is a meal you've had a thousand times, and your palette is far more refined than it was the first time you tasted it.

Running out

Chasers could be the most polished, best looking game in the whole of the world, but it wouldn't change the fact that it's trading on the App Store's past glory.

This is pretty much the definition of generic. It walks a straight line, never deviating or straying from a path we've all walked down a hundred times before.

Chasers review - Just another endless runner?

A boring endless runner. Its biggest crime is that we've seen it all before
Score
Harry Slater
Harry Slater
Harry used to be really good at Snake on the Nokia 5110. Apparently though, digital snake wrangling isn't a proper job, so now he writes words about games instead.