Explosionade

Developer: Mommy's Best Games
Steam Release: Sept 2015
Hours Played: 2.7
Similar To: Fowl Space / Gigantic Army / Room 13
Rating: 2/5 Parsnips

GAMEPLAY

Explosionade explodes onto the scene thanks to Mommy's Best Games, the developers who gave us insane titles such as: Serious Sam Double D XL; its similar counterpart - Weapon of Choice and the equally over-the-top extreme shooter Shoot 1 Up. Comparatively speaking, Explosionade is a more tame offering yet retains the outrageous spirit of the aforementioned games. You jump around from ledge to ledge on a single screen with your powered-up mech and armed with rapid-fire missiles, grenade-style bombs and multi-use shield - destroy enemies around you in an effort to enter the exit portal. Levels are short and generally last around 2 or 3 minutes. As its title suggests, you will certainly see your fair share of explosions along the way.
 

BALANCE & PACE

Your main weapon is rapid-fire missiles to pick off the fodder but you'll also need grenade-style bombs (that explode after 2 or 3 seconds) for the tougher enemies and to blast your way through barriers. You get 3 bombs that get replenished at a steady rate so you can't spam them. You'll encounter flying enemies as well as ground troops of various kinds plus missile turrets and robust metallic pods. The game is split into 30 levels but there is no level-select screen (unless you go for the Practice option) because it's essentially a score-attack game where high-score is king. Plow through the levels and then check your score on the Top 10 local high-score chart or on the online leaderboards. Clearing a level quickly of all enemies and collecting gold all helps to boost that score. 

PRESENTATION & DESIGN 

Thanks to fairly retro art-style graphics, Explosionade has an old 1990s arcade look and feel about it. However it has a clean and crisp look and like all MBGs titles is bug-free and reliably stable. (Although it didn't seem to like alt-tabbing.) I also like the varied and chunky gunshots as you clicked through the menus. You play the game to a fairly bland arena-rock style soundtrack but it is unobtrusive and I hardly noticed it. The UI may be toggled on or off but why you wouldn't want to keep track of your health I don't know. The only mildly annoying design choice was the decision to only display the score after level completion. 
 
 

PROGRESS SYSTEM

As mentioned, Explosionade is essentially a score-attack game with emphasis centred around your high-score. There are no upgrades between missions (and no power-ups come to think of it) just you, your mech and previous knowledge as to how levels are designed and the best way to go about beating them. Thankfully, although presented rather plainly in that Times New Roman font, you have six sets of easy to negotiate high-scores charts. Your local chart shows your Top 10 scores under the three difficulties of Chilled, Normal or Serious while online scores also shows your scores under these difficulties with the addition of your overall rank; always good for motivation.
 

CONCLUSION

MBG have always been good at delivering arcade-style titles for the odd half hour blast and Explosionade fits the bill. I did feel un-informed about my score though - not to say a little confused by the score-system itself - but this (and the pointless story/tutorial getting in the way too much) is the only real minor criticism I had with the game. Suffice to say: clearing a level of all monsters; clearing it in under 30 seconds and collecting gold is all good. You get a nice zoom-out and zoom-in feature (but why you'll play at zoom-in I don't know), a few boss levels; a bounce ability while activating the shield from a great height and a jet-pack ability albeit weak and fairly useless. But for a quick blast without the grind - Explosionade is worth a look.