RO®

Posted on March 20th, 2009. Written by Arron.

RO® is the brand new logic based puzzler from touch development studio Roamular. I was tipped off on this game a few days back now, and since then have ran a contest on Twitter giving one of you lucky guys and gals the chance to win a copy! ..

Congrats to @FPUGirl! – You just won yourself a copy of Roamluar’s RO®.

RO® [App Store] is played on a board of 5 cylindrical titles. The aim of the game is to match these 5 tiles with the static background tile, to restore and complete the object or scene pictured in the fastest amount of time possible, and with the least moves. Here’s the catch – moving each title will (randomly) also move other tiles in the sequence. So while you might manage to twist one tile into the correct place for a minute or two, the other correctly placed titles will move out of their position.

It’s a fun game of logic. A game which requires logically analyzing what’s going on, and reacting accordingly. There’s an (admittedly hidden) pattern to how it works, but I won’t spoil it for anyone just yet ..

Gameplay
There are four levels of difficulty in RO®. Novice, Intermediate, Advanced and Expert. By default, Intermediate, Advanced and Expert are locked. As you progress through the game, the puzzles (even on the same difficulty) become increasingly harder to solve.

RO® works like this. Entering the game your presented with 5 cylindrical tiles. Entering a level RO® will automatically twist the tiles out of order, and the aim is then to put them back together in the right order, to restore the puzzle to it’s former self. To move them back you just tap, hold and drag each one. Each time you select a tile, it will turn orange signifying it’s selected. Touching and drag the tiles will twist each 90Ëšin the chosen direction, accompanied by a very space-like sound – which I have to say is pretty trippy.

On the playing screen you have the title of the puzzle, time taken to complete the puzzle and how many moves you’ve taken since starting the puzzle. If you’ve finished a puzzle, it’s stored and you can progress to it by touching the next button in the top right.

On this note, the game also saves your current progress. So if your in the middle of a game and accidentally touch the home button, you can resume right where you left off. Once you’ve completed a level, this is also saved along with the your best time for that level and amount of moves taken to complete it.

Visuals and Interface
Although challenging in it’s game play, RO® features a very user intuitive UI. Although not much to look at (visually) the way the game has been designed, anyone can play it. The visuals are ok. They could be better, but they’re satisfactory. Don’t picture images which have been made on paint, they have a certain ‘quality’ about them. – A quality I like.

Overall
RO® is an easy to master (but challenging) logical puzzler, which should pass a few hours. Simple in it’s approach, it’s almost minimalist. I think It’s because it’s so simple that I actually like it. Last night RO® had me hooked in it’s twisted ways for a least an hour, and because of this I’m recommending anyone with an iPhone or iPod touch (who loves good solid puzzlers) to go check this out!

Current Status: Recommended

Reviewed at: v1.0
Reviewed on Firmware: 3.0 (beta)
Download size: 3.9MB
Released on: 08th Feb 2009
Retails for: £1.19

Compatible with: iPod touch Gen 1 & 2 / iPhone Classic / iPhone 3G