Name: Save the Turtles
Price: 4.99
Genre: Action, Puzzle, Adventure
Publisher: Sabarasa
Released: Mar 2010
Review: I saw this game on one of the eShop's puzzle games lists. The graphics looked good versus a lot of eShop games, but the title made it sound really hokey, and I had never heard of it. I still had enough curiosity to look it up online, and good reviews lead to me impulse-buying it.
Its a very active grid-based game which takes place on a beach where you undust, tap to hatch, and then form a path to lead the little turtles into lines of 3 or more, which will cause a wave to come wash them to safety. There are of course some mean critters impeding you around the board, and even the sun will cause the poor turtles to get too hot if left exposed too long. Your job is to rescue all the turtles within the time limit. After a time new types of turtles (colors) are introduced, as well as a couple special items like seaweed and rainbow turtles.
The graphics are really cute and quite nice for a budget title. I really didn't like the gimmicky rub and tap motions you have to do to unearth the turtles, it seemed to make the game somewhat frantic, and yet I wanted to keep playing the game... so maybe I am ok with it after all. My main beef with it is I seem to have trouble getting the turtles to path properly, but maybe I'm doing it wrong.
The tutorial is pretty helpful, and the game has a good-length story mode as well as other modes to unlock. Its a pretty straightforward game, but has enough to it to be a good puzzler for all ages.
Rating: 4/5 gaia_star gaia_star gaia_star gaia_star emotion_bigvein
Other Reviews: [Nintendo Life] [IGN] [Gamer Vision]