Pentumble really sticks with you
Pentumble is an exciting platformer where you face many dangerous obstacles in your race against time to get the most stars in each level. Players must avoid hitting spiky wheels of death, fire, and other such ominous elements in a quest to reach the star at the end of each level. This is a perilous journey most of the time as you must be very careful and strategic about your movement; overshooting a jump most assuredly mean death unless you are lucky. The game costs $1.99 and runs on all iOS devices with iOS version 7.0 or later.
The pacing in Pentumble's 36 levels is interesting. There are some easy levels at the beginning which do a nice job of introducing players to the controls and obstacles fairly early on. By about level five, things start to get tense but then you are given a little breather with some easier levels. This pattern continues for some time until about the final 10 levels. Here the levels are much harder than before and you find yourself feeling stumped more often.
The pacing makes Pentumble rewarding to play for long stretches of time because you feel very victorious when you complete a tough level. You become excited about the challenges awaiting you in every level that follows. If that is not enough motivation for you to keep playing, Pentumble also features a star rating system that rewards players for completing a level in a certain amount of time and this adds to the games replay value.
Pentumble features a character that can latch onto platforms upside down, right side up, and even on the side. You can even walk on or around this platform and some levels require you to move your character on the platform to avoid obstacles. The controls are really fluid and you feel more in control of your actions because of this. Fluid controls also means that you have to think about your actions more. One wrong move could send your character jumping into a spiky wheel. This was an unexpected challenge, but a welcome addition as it makes the game feel more responsive and fun.
The platforms themselves were creative as some could be simple panels that move in two directions. Others were bubbles that pop if you stand on them wrong. These platforms test players' skills and adaptability to the changing environments as they can show up in any combination and order.
In a couple of the later levels there were some collision problems when trying to move over certain objects, such as a pipe. The character would get stuck in the object and sometimes the ground. You can get the character unstuck, but this takes some time and you are better off restarting the level. This was the only real problem I ran across while playing and it didn't deter me from playing again, it was just an annoyance.
The art style in Pentumble is clean and not extravagant which works very well for this game. Even the typeface and user interface elements echoes this same clean appearance. It is visually very attractive. The music also fits very well with the overall theme. It is fun and quirky, which makes the game more enjoyable to play.
Pentumble is a great platformer that features interesting platform challenges as well as a fluid control scheme and it is recommended for those who would like to test their skills with new challenges in platforming.
