Shrapnel

It's often suggested that in moments of deep turmoil a nice long walk can serve as a worthwhile tonic when under pressure.

Unfortunately for the militant and put-upon heroine of Dogtown's twin-stick shooter, too much of her time is spent wandering around chilling out and not enough engaging in worthwhile action.

As a result, Shrapnel proves neither compelling nor complex enough to immerse you in its futuristic world.

The game is based on a series of comics by Radical Interactive, which tell the story of aggrieved former Solar Alliance member Sam Narayan.

After discovering that the Alliance has been – shock, horror - committing genocide in pursuit of galactic domination, Sam joins the rebel resistance in Shrapnel City to combat the military leadership. This is where you come in.

Relayed to you via console terminals dotted about the flat and at times seemingly endless landscape, the 16 Alliance-defiance missions range from protecting an outpost to rearranging some furniture in three minutes flat.

In between these genuine bouts of frenetic action, you're tasked with eliminating a specific number of enemies to progress to the next mission. The only problem is that cannon fodder isn’t always readily at hand, resulting in more time spent meandering than shooting.

Too much of Shrapnel is spent in unwilling downtime: having breathlessly staved off tens of foes over in one sector, you're then tasked with ticking off a ridiculously large enemy hit list.

During one mission this lasted for 12 excruciatingly pedestrian minutes (yes, I really did time it). I drifted aimlessly hunting down soldiers, stopping once in a while to let them come to daddy instead.

Performance issues such as slowdown and painful crashes persisted on an iPhone 3G even with the latest update, and animation glitches reared their ugly heads in the form of hollow streetposts and trapped Alliance fighters left dangling for mercy among the scenery.

If you do come a cropper at any stage, a neat continue feature allows you to re-enter the fray with only points-related penitence.

In conjunction with the long slow rambles and the less than compelling gunfights, such a lacking technical performance causes Shrapnel to shoot itself in the foot.