Snowball Mania, by crazyman32, Review

It is the time of year when we all come out from our computer rooms and enjoy some quality bonding time with our families. We exchange wonderful gifts, except for the ugly sweater Aunt Allie always gives to you, and play games which are not videogames. If you live in a colder area which has snowfall, you've played snowball fighting with your friends before. And this game by crazyman32 tries to draw back on that experience with some rather awesome twists in Snowball Mania. Even if you have not experienced snowfall and snowball fights, its a pretty simple concept (trust me).

When the game is first started, stats screen with your points, kills, and deaths greets you as well as an upgrades button. It looks rather dull as 90 % of your screen is filled with an empty white space. There is not revolving camera around the map of any sort to establish atmosphere, no background image which shows you what you are going to experience. Nothing. Which really seems disappointing.

When you finally push the start button, you will be sent into a most-likely flat white map. Selecting the snowball tool will allow you to start tossing small balls at your enemies, which you have no idea who they are because the game does a poor job of explaining to you what team you are on. In fact, there is no indication of team colors besides the name tags above players, making long range engagements harder than they already were.

After getting yourself acquainted, you will surely encounter your enemy quite soon and will try to throw snowballs at him. The engagement is one which you will surely lose, as Snowball Mania falls into the same problems as Base Wars: The Land. The players with time already invested into the game acquire upgrades which will allow them to easily best you in a duel.

The snowballs, unless upgraded extensively, have really, REALLY poor accuracy which gives new definition to the phrase "spray and pray." Most of the time spent fighting in game will result in you spam clicking that left mouse button while standing near a snowball pile to stock up on ammunition in order to out spam your opponents.

The combat system is somewhat saved by crazyman32's genius idea of including a mounted machine gun into the game, and it is well executed. When operated, it puts you into a fixed camera view where you can control the gun with your mouse and it moves on your screen, sort of like the arcade game Duck Hunt. The guns are fitted with a neat reloading and ammo count GUI and has a nice firing sound to it. Although it suffers from the low accuracy spam just like the snowballs you throw, it is acceptable as it is a MACHINE GUN! I like my heavy weaponry. 

Pew! Pew! Pew! with the turret!

The user interface though is really sleek and simple. I've already mentioned the lack of a good welcome screen, but the rest of the interface is well designed. The upgrade bars, the time and ammo display, and the stats screen all have uniformed colors and style, offering togetherness to the game.

But perhaps more importantly, the snowball effects are really lacking. Sure there is a sound which plays when the ball is thrown, but that's it. Getting hit by a snowball doesn't blind you with snow particles like many of the Roblox gear does, no, it just plays the default damage screen. Similarly disappointing, the snowballs hitting the terrain just sticks there. It sticks there like a piece of gigantic white gum.

The maps themselves are built quite nicely and look very natural. The use of different materials, shapes, and colors contribute to the atmosphere of the snowball fight. However, having a well built map doesn't mean it is a well designed map. Nearly all maps are composed of two well covered bases with a plain, flat, and coverless mid section. The no-man's-land maps promotes even more of the spammy gameplay as players wildly jump around everywhere due to the lack of any sort of useful cover. And a skilled machine gunner will keep the enemy away from your base and force more spammy gameplay.

Blue fort. Notice the nice use of wood.

Overall, it feels as if your skill in this game is based on a random number generator. As well as the game looks with its sleek GUI and detailed buildings, the gameplay is just lackluster. If you are willing to spend time grinding it out with the spammy weapons, you will eventually escape this and get more accurate weapons. But be warned, this will take a long time as upgrade costs scale dramatically.

Rating:
7/10

Poor combat and unfair upgrades, made up for partly by the machine-gun turret and the awesome GUIs.