Organic Panic Review | MOUSE n JOYPAD

 

When I booted up my copy of “Organic Panic” I was presented with a title menu that had me believing the game I was about to play was designed for a population less than half my age. It had all the trappings that connote the general understand of what “Candy Crush” is -in essence; I was expecting an overabundance of the intellectually-reduced type of design that I do not need to extrapolate further on. Thankfully, in more ways than not, “Organic Panic” is far from being another one of those games.

In the world of Last Limb’s introductory title, inhabitants are composed of the personified Meats & Cheeses and Veggies & Fruits population. At one point in the not-too-distant past, all was well between the animal-derived and vegan-friendly. The Steak kids would have been easily seen playing hopscotch with the coconut children. That is until billionaire baby cheese, whose income is only paralleled by his hate for the fairer food groups, decided to rally all the meats & cheeses to join in his movement to destroy the fruits & veggies: also referred to as the Organics. Armed to head with guns and armor only a billionaire could afford, you play as four of the Organics as they carry on their magical quest.

 

Fill up an entire level with water. Sure, you can do that.

Of these Organics, the four that you control at one point or another are Cherry, Kiwi, Carrot, and Coconut. Each one of these four is classified by their respective magic powers. Coconut can levitate objects and enemies. Kiwi can control water, which pretty much means he can blast water out of his hands. Carrot is like Kiwi, except replace water with fire. Then there is Cherry, who is like the previous two, but her speciality is turning the dirt beneath her feet into a deadly projectile. The magic powers are controlled by pressing the CIRCLE button and aiming with the left stick. This mechanic works fine for the little amount of emphasis the game puts on precise aiming, but when there are times when targeting a special power towards an enemy or breakable object is important to a level, the fact that there is no aiming reticle can make it a little frustrating. Even a trajectory path indicator like “Angry Birds” would have been suitable here.

It would be a fit addition to this game mostly because the it plays somewhat reminiscent to “Angry Birds”. Though I would go a step further and say that “Organic Panic” allows for a more layered type of gameplay.

Perhaps the most alluring aspect of this game are the possibilities for destruction which the custom physics engine allows for. Last Limb did a great job of building an engine that actually allows for everything in the foreground of each level to be destroyed. This is in part due to dynamic physics engine which allows for each element to react realistic based on their physical properties. This means, if you’re playing as Carrot and you are standing on a wooden platform, your magic flame projectiles will burn a hole through it. This simple reaction in a world where you can control dirt, fire, water, and mass, can add up to quite a spell of destructible creativity.

Adding to the destruction are even more abilities you can wield. Aptly titled as your “special” power, each character has an additional power that is pretty much just the enhanced version of their initial magic power. For Cherry, this allows her to burrow through any and all materials that compose the level. Coconut can fly, Carrot can turn into fire, and Kiwi can…you guessed it, turn into water. These specials, like their less potent magic counterparts, are obtained from pick-ups in the level. There are also other pick-ups that allow for further augmentations to these powers. For instance, the “speed” pick-up allows for both quick movement and dispelling of said powers. Shield pickups allow for invincibility. Each one serves its purpose, and when collected all at once, it can get a little crazy. To attempt you from just going all out for each level, these added enhancements serve their purpose on a timed basis -around five seconds, although when collecting additional ones within the five seconds, it is added on to the previous time.

 

Organic Panic, where trees are here to make chop liver out of beef cubes.

All of these abilities would be for naught if the game did not allow for some semblance of free will to be creative with the environment while making your way past the armed meat & cheese militia. That’s exactly what the game allows. In fact, it encourages it by the placement of enemies in relation to their surrounding. At times, a boxing glove touting steak might be too high atop a cliff to reach. As Cherry, with her special power at full blast, she can easily carve through the cliff, allowing the steak to slide down happily to his doom and to your joy as you gain extra end-level points for doing so.

Gladly, these types of moments are not a few and far between, but perhaps to the detriment of the game. The single player is composed of roughly between 75 and 100 levels, and although the developers do a decent job of mixing things up (i.e. playing upwards as all four characters within a given level; switching between them with the TRIANGLE button), everything that is at your disposal can already be found within the first couple of levels of the game. Although, there are the co-op and multiplayer aspects of the game that add a little extra flavor into the pickup selection (i.e. acid, which adds a small lasting effect to your special projectile) it still comes off as repetitive after fifteen or twenty minutes.

Of course, this is not to say that I had a bad time while playing the game, but by the game’s single player ending, I was pretty spent to the point where it took some time and effort to get back to try the co-op and multiplayer mode. Co-op plays just like the single player, except it is two-player enabled. Not much to really add on here. Multiplayer is very much in the arena, Vs. realm and plays like Mario Bros. with a heavy emphasis on physics. Again, nothing bad, but really just average in terms of the amount of fun I was able to get out of this mode after spending so much time with the single player. Perhaps some added variety with mechanics, pick-ups, or anything else would have been something to inject a reason for this mode’s existence besides the fact that they allow for other people to join in.

Though for anyone interested in a seemingly kiddish, yet aesthetically vibrant 2D side-scroller that encourages chaos and destruction look no further. Just beware, look long enough and you might wind up ready to move on to something else.