iWater Flow overview
iWater Flow is a nostalgic “water jet” game popular in the late ’70s and 80′s where pressing buttons shot water within a water tank to push beads or rings around as you attempt to accomplish a particular goal. Tomy Waterfuls line contained a wide assortment of unusual water jet handheld games, some of which closely match what this app is attempting to mimic. It is developed by Dancing Dots and published by Bulky Pix, and its current price in the App Store is $0.99.
With iWater Flow, you are presented an assortment of tanks, equipped with two water jet buttons, one or more posts, and several floating rings. The goal is always to place as many rings onto the posts using either the water jet buttons or gravity itself (you can rotate the iPhone).
Different game modes provide variety: You have a sandbox mode with no particular goal, a timer mode where you must place all the rings onto a post as fast as possible, and a mode that counts how many ring placements you can make in a given time frame.
The assorted tanks differ only by their backdrop artwork and whether they have one or two posts (and the placement of said posts).
Check out some images of the original water toys and a few of the in-game images:
Presentation
The menu system is well polished, presenting the various water tank games in their original boxes. You rotate through the various tank games and select the one you wish to play. It then allows you to choose your mode of play:
Classic (a basic sandbox mode)
Rush (post all the rings as fast as you can)
Time Attack (post as many rings as you can over 3 minutes).
One very annoying feature on the main game selection is an in-box notifier that flashes until you open up the “Bulky Channel” and manually read each and every ad for their upcoming games. This is crass advertisement and should be stripped from the app. At the very least, Bulky, remove the flash from the indicator.
Gameplay
The gameplay involves holding the iPhone in a portrait position and sliding your two thumbs over two water jet buttons (one on each side of the tank). The faster you slide, the more powerful the jet stream will be. You can also orient the iPhone to affect ring placement via gravity.
Rings hit each other and interact with the background and water very nicely. The overall gameplay effect is a good replication of the water game experience. There are a few bugs however: If you shake the phone front-to-back when a ring is well posted, it somehow magically becomes free.
The three gameplay modes offer a little variety:
Classic
Classic is a simple sandbox just as you would have purchased an actual tank game: No computerized game goals or timers. Just you and the tank.
Rush
Here, you try to post all of your rings as fast as you can. Once done, the game ends. All rings must be on posts (if they are knocked off you must re-place them). Your score is kept.
Time Attack
Here, you have three minutes to place as many rings onto posts as you can. Once a ring is placed, it disappears from the ring and reappears near a jet (so you have an ever-revolving amount of rings to work with).
Longevity
While it has four different water toys and three different play modes, there really isn’t much to make you return to the game. The game has support for OpenFeint which provides global leader boards, and some achievements to unlock (17).
You won’t be playing this game for very long. Thats not to say it isn’t worth a look, but its appeal to most is strictly nostalgia. I let some children try the game and it is mesmerizing to control virtual water, but the game did not hold their attention long.
Graphics
The graphics are passable. The backdrops and layout are quite nice, and there is a water line present. Shaking and rocking the phone (or even rotating it upside down) will move the water line. Its not quite as smooth and fast as the drink gag apps such as iPint, but its a nice touch.
The rings and posts are unfortunately jaggie and could use quite a bit of anti-aliasing, especially given the limited activity present in the game itself.
The rings do interact both with the post and each other, and react realistically with gravity and the water streams.
Sound
There is no in game music, however there are water sounds, both from moving the iphone and from depressing the jet buttons. The sounds provided by these actions are pretty good.
Future Plans
Bulky Pix has confirmed plans for an update that will provide in-app purchasing of additional tank designs. I hope they consider removing the ad channel annoyances, and look into more Tomy Waterful games for influences beyond ring-on-post. For example, beads-in-basket, water valves, maze walls, etc.
| iWater Flow Review | |
|---|---|
| Gameplay |   |
| A nostalgic ride back to the '80s, the gameplay fairly accurately recreates the water games many of us remember from our childhood. The game is not difficult to master. | |
| Graphics | |
| There are some bad aliasing effects that should not be present in such a simple game, but the water physics are interesting and the backdrops are quite well done. | |
| Sound | |
| There is no in-game music. There are water sounds associated with iPhone movement and depressing the jet buttons. The sounds are decent enough, but not particularly special. This does help in creating a realistic simulation of the original toy, so in that sense it can be seen as appropriate. | |
| Longevity |  |
| While there is OpenFeint integration and achievements to couple with the unlockable bonus toy and the multiple play modes, there is still little appeal to revisit the game. | |
| Overall | |
|---|---|
| iWater Flow makes a nice demonstration of the iPhone's unique abilities, but as a game it is strictly for the nostalgic. Lets see if a few updates improve it as there is a lot of potential to work with here | |
