Beware Planet Earth Game Review

Story

Beware Planet Earth is a tower defense style game. The objective of the game is to protect Farmer Barney’s cows from the invading Aliens (cue dramatic music here). Beware Planet Earth was developed by Lightmare Studios. The game is being distributed through Bandai Namco Games Europe and is available on Steam for $9.99 and includes bonus content as well as the iTunes store for $3.99 for the full version.

Graphics

The graphics are very silly and help to keep the player engaged in the experience of the game. Though they are basic in design, each character has a good amount of detail and uniqueness. The colors are vivid but not jarring and in your face.

Audio

The music in Beware Planet Earth adds to the game’s level of enjoyment with a 50’s style campy alien movie vibe. It ties in well with the game’s theme and never seems overbearing or in need of being muted. The same can be said for the sound effects. They add to the experience with different sounds for each click action and special ability, for example the ray gun sounds like you think a ray gun should.

Gameplay

As with the typical tower defense style game, Beware Planet Earth offers several different offensive and defensive items that the player must select from when starting a level. The basic items are overactive freezers to slow the aliens, barrel shaped turrets to shoot them, machines to generate the cogs used to buy defensive items, a ray gun, and land mines. New, more elaborate weapons are unlocked as the game advances. The player has to choose the specific items for use at the start of each level and then place them strategically on the map to stop the aliens before they retrieve the cows and return them to the alien ship. The aliens are provided with humorous back stories that give clues to their in game attributes. For example, the Ninja Aliens always wear red because red is the fastest color. They are all definitely worth a read through.

Review

Beware Planet Earth combines the wackiness of Plants vs. Zombies and the strategy of a tower defense game mixed with a touch of capture the flag, or in this case retrieve the cows. Compared to other tower defense games where the maps can be quite large, the maps in Beware Planet Earth are all small and available placement space varies based on the path cut through the map. It makes the game feel a little more frantic at times, and requires thought on each placement to get the best use of resources and to avoid wasted items that later have to be destroyed to make way for other things. Overall, Beware Planet Earth is very enjoyable and full of wackiness. If you enjoy other cartoon-like strategy games (PvZ, Angry Birds, etc) then this game is definitely worth checking out. It can be enjoyed by the whole family and would be convenient for travel distractions.

Rating

I give Beware Planet Earth a rating of 3.5, and at only $3.99 on the iTunes store, it is definitely worth downloading.