Zuma Review

Costas Stephanides’s Review

A great conversion from the PC best seller.

When I got bored of playing Bejewelled on the PC I decided to play a dodgy looking game called Zuma. It was the usual connect 3 balls to remove them from the playing area and gradually work your way to removing all the balls. What was novel was that the balls followed one behind another on a spiraling path. A very strange game which I never really got to grips with but I played it anyway during my lunchtimes. Now the mobile version is available...

Mobile conversions usually have a few options missing and are just a stripped down version of the classic you know and love. The only feature that suffers in Zuma - Mobile is the sound. Everything else is spot on.

There are plenty of different game options; Adventure, Gauntlet and Practice. Adventure is basically story mode where you progress from Stage 1 all the way to the end. Each Stage is made up of a number of levels and once you complete the stage you can then play subsequent games from here. The learning curve is quite good, the levels start off fairly easy with plenty of special balls to help you on your way. As you progress, more and more coloured balls are used and special balls are more rare. With Gauntlet mode you select the course layout and difficulty level and then its a continuous game. Practice mode isn't as obvious as it sounds. As with Gauntlet you select your course and difficulty. However, levels can be completed as normal and the game gets progressively harder as you advance. Any more game options would just be ridiculous!

The graphics are quite good. The colours are distinct and there are some cool backgrounds towards the end of the game but very basic ones at the beginning. I've already touched on the sound, all there is a little intro/outro tune. No sound effects during the game. If it was achoice between sound and gameplay, then gameplay wins every time.

The controls work surprisingly well. Naturally you can use left/4 and right/6, you can also use down/8 to flip the aim by 180 degrees; to shoot the balls press 5. The keypad is not as versatile as a mouse but the game speed takes this into account and you can never blame the handset for your failures.

Finally, the longevity. How long will this game last on your phone and how often will you play it. Even though I was not a huge fan of the original game, I couldn't stop playing this version. It really is that adictive. My advice, go to shockwave.com or yahoo games and play the free version of Zuma for your PC. If you decide its your type of game then the mobile version will definitely not disappoint you. A full game can take over an hour to play but with auto save, you can easily play over a number of sessions. There are also two high score tables (one for Adventure and one for Gauntlet), there's always something to aim for.

The poor sound has dragged the overall score down but our ice cold award is fully justified as this game will keep you hooked.