Yes! We have more maze games for you, and this one is the iOS port of Dirk Baumann’s ‘The Magic Labyrinth‘.
Gameplay
You might ask me what would possibly differentiate this game from the slew of labyrinth/maze based games? Well for one, it at least has the distinction of calling itself something more than just labyrinth. Yes, the world labyrinth does sound a lot more intriguing than just maze, but the labyrinth is such a deeply rooted part of our (read: Western) cultural heritage that it is not as distinct as you might think. Hell, most people don’t even realise that the word comes from the Ancient Greek myth of Theseus (you know the one with the minotaur), which incidentally is also where we get the word for clue (the ball of yarn Theseus got from Ariadne to guide him through the maze was called a clew).
You then might ask what does a game of insivible walls and trying to map your way blindly to a predetermined location in the maze have to do with the myth of Theseus? I would then endeavour to explain how clever you were for noticing only a passing resemblence and proceed to congratulate you on getting the gist of the game.
So excuse my circumlocution but I felt I needed more of a lead in to explain a single sentence game premise.
You are a student wizard, and thrust into a 6×6 grid, where some of those grid borders are in fact invisible walls. You won’t know which ones are until you develop a squashed nose through trial and error. Within that grid there is an assortment of symbols and you have to navigate your way to which ever symbol is indicated. When one is collected a new one shows up.
There are two modes of game play, ‘watch out’ is how many symbols can you collect before you bump into walls ten times (from memory I assume, or from pen and paper if you’ve played these games before), and the timed mode being how many symbols you collect before the time runs out.
Implementation
I wouldn’t say this is a bad implementation of the game, since I think most of its limitations are inherent to the game itself. It’s probably a game that is more geared towards children and families than hard and fast gamers. This is just simply because there is not a lot of strategic depth. Whether you find this fun is ultimately a matter of preference and style choice.
There isn’t that much to say about the implementation except for the following two things. Firstly, you don’t really need a tutorial either because the game is readily intuitive and easily grasped. So the in-game manual should suffice. Secondly, however, is a pretty significant gap in the implementation from the physical board game. The original game does have a multiplayer option, which was round based. Since this effectively makes the game a one-player board game against yourself, it seriously detracts from the game being a complete gaming experience. This is not like Small World, where you are limited to a two-player implementation, but completely changes the dynamic of the game.
Verdict
5/10: I can’t really say anything bad about this game, but I can’t really shower it with praise. A very luke-warm nod from my part.
