Slyder Adventures

Technology means we can watch, play, or listen to pretty much anything we like, at any time. Of course, one of the side effects of all of this is that we have less patience for anything we do happen to sample.

It makes you wonder how well a game like Slyder Adventures, which doesn't start as it ends, will be taken. This is one of those oh-so-rare slow burners.

Slyder himself is just a wee ball. You guide him around a series of mazes either by using your finger to twist and turn the map or by physically turning the phone itself, the screen accommodating itself to your movements.

The aim is to eat as much as you can, with nuggets of cheese, fruit and ice cream providing a trail of treats for you to pick up on your way to the finish line.

At first, that's all you have to do. With no clock, pitfalls or enemies of any kind, early encounters seem like nothing more than a jolly in some bizarre maze. This easy start, however, is merely an opening salvo for the gameplay blitz to come.

Level by level, new elements are introduced: boosters that pelt you at speed in a particular direction, locked doors that can only be opened with specific keys, bouncers that ping you about on contact, and globules of goo that slow your progress that change play dramatically.

That's because the dangers also begin to mount up. There is, for instance, a whole host of ways you can lose a life. Robot patrols, fire vents, electrified walls, and pools of fire all make it their goal to knock one off your tally of lives.

Usually placed in unavoidable areas or at the end of a great line of treats, getting to the finish line unscathed quickly moves the realm of certainty to that of skillful possibility. In other words, completing levels later in the game isn't breezy.

Slyder Adventures runs on a fine balance. With lives being lost with such ease, it becomes imperative to pick up as much food as you can. Each and every bit adds to your score at the end of a level, with each 10,000 points milestone passed earning you another life.

Of course, the path to points inevitably swings you in the direction of peril and keeping a fix on Slyder's movements is a mighty test indeed, but never an unfair one.

This might not be new ground in any sense (Slyder borrows heavily from pinball, and the original Escher-fulled Sonic The Hedgehog special zones), but Slyder Adventures doesn't show its winning hand until late in the game.

Whether you personally have the persistence to see it through is up to you, but some things are worth devoting time to.