review: one single life
For those of you who don’t know, I own a slab of wonderment known as an iPhone. Specifically, I have an iPhone 3G which I am so glad that I will be upgrading this summer (In about 2 months. Thank god and all that). Because of this, and my usual tendency to just trawl the Internet for no reason other than I’m bored, I find myself on occasion randomly searching through the App Store. I don’t always come across anything that good, but yesterday I came across a game called One Single Life.
The basic gist of the game is about making jumps across buildings that, in real life, would more than likely see you plummet to your death. One tap of your screen sees you run off, the next sees you make your leap of faith and start praying that you’ll make it to the other side. Make it, and you proceed to your next death-defying jump. Miss and… well, wheeeeeeeeeeee-SPLAT!
Doesn’t seem that good a game? Well, the trick is in the name. In One Single Life, you only get one life. So if you die, then that’s it. Game over. Literally. You basically can’t play the game again unless you delete and reinstall the game (which is do-able, given the game is currently free). This is a serious bone of contention if you check the comments on the OSL page on iTunes.
OK, the name is a little bit of a fallacy. There is actually a second life available, if you play through all the jumps in the credits, which means there is two lifes before the game locks itself. But this little USP is what increases the tension in trying to get to the end of the game. If the game charged you for every time you reinstalled, then yeah I think people would have reason to be fully P.O’d (even if it was only 59p). But One Single Life provides an interesting little aside, especially if you can be part of the 4% in the world (developer claim) that will be able to complete the game - talk about a sense of achievement if you can beat your way into that club.
8/10
