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Herman the Hermit – Quirky & Amusing Platformer Jumping Game

Posted Thursday, September 29th, 2011 at 8:28 am by Jonathan Lonczak 0 Comments

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Herman the Hermit. Fling from snow-covered peaks and platforms in this zany jumping game. Take the role of Herman, a crazy old hermit that lives high up in the Himalayan Mountains. With years and years of meditation and training, Herman has developed Ninja-like skills and the mindset of a mad man. Take control over this lunatic and jump from platform to platform in this endless, extremely addictive jumper game! Brag about your high score to your friends using Facebook and OpenFeint!

Price: $0.99

Tested on: Motorola Xoom, Sony Xperia Play
Content Rating: Everyone

AndroidTapp.com Android Game Review:

Pros & Cons:

Pros

• Amusing side-scrolling platform jumping game!
• Fantastic graphics and sound effects!
• Unique power-ups plus collectible gift boxes for in-game trophy system!
• Get both the tablet version and phone version of Herman the Hermit in one purchase!
• Open Feint support!

Cons

• Game becomes repetitive very quickly if you do not pay attention to achievements or trophy system.
• No alternative gameplay modes.
• Controls are mediocre and leave you feeling a little out of control.
• No alternative game environment and background schemes.

Features:

Herman the Hermit is a fun platforming jumping game for Android & iOS. You jump from platform to platform changing floating icy terraces into lovely gardens. Herman the Hermit features endless gameplay, unique power-ups, OpenFeint support and achievements, a trophy system, and support for both your smartphone and your tablet all in the same purchase!

The story of Herman the Hermit (per the Market notes) is that Herman is a “crazy old hermit” who lives in the Himalayan Mountains. After years of training Herman develops “Ninja-like” skills and must jump from platform to platform creating new life in the frozen tundra. So the object of the game is simple: Jump on as many platforms as you can and collect power-ups to move faster and play longer so you can transform the entire Himalayan Mountain range into a green paradise!

The controls for the game are simple. To jump from one platform to another swipe your finger in the direction of the platform you wish to move to. The higher the arc of your swipe the higher that Herman will jump. To jump straight up swipe your finger directly vertical to jump down at an angle, slide your finger down at the desired angle. These are the only controls needed to play Herman the Hermit.

Another important feature that must be accounted for is the time bar. Although you have infinite lives in this game you cannot play forever because there is a timer slowly ticking down for every second that you play the game. In order to stop the timer from depleting and to refill it so that you can continue playing you need to skip platforms that are shown in your path. The more platforms you skip the higher the increase to your time bar. An additional method to increase the time bar is to jump on every platform that you see. If you jump on every platform without skipping any you receive a time bonus and you receive extra points. Both of these methods add additional factors to pay attention to while playing and make the game more challenging.

Strewn throughout the game are power-ups and gift boxes. Power-ups grant the player more play time, speed increases, platform skips, and other unique abilities. Some power-ups that can be seen throughout the game are the rocket, the jet pack, and the clock. The clock extends your time bar, the rocket skips you quickly through the level, and the jet pack is a slightly less powerful version of the rocket.

Gift boxes are another kind of collectible item that is strewn throughout the game. The difference between gift boxes and power-ups is that gift boxes contain some of the collectible trophies hidden throughout the game. The trophy system is similar to OpenFeint achievements except they have a small back story and a large 3D model which can be viewed in the trophy room. One of the collectible trophies I collected was the tears of the Stone God. Each of the collectible trophies has a small witticism which matches the trophy’s name and adds just another quirky feature to this already quirky game.

Finally, Herman the Hermit features OpenFeint social achievement system support. This allows you to compete against others on a global scale and gives you in-game achievements to work towards. I love it when OpenFeint is integrated in to a game, because it instantly increases the game’s replay value due to the natural goal integration that comes with the platform. As I played through the game I unlocked many achievements like “Rocketeer,” “Like a Rabbit,” and “Jumping Jack Flash.” Each of the achievements was performing various feats through the game or collecting a certain number of power-ups and give the gamer something to work towards while playing.

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Fun Factor:

Herman the Hermit is an enjoyable game to play on both the smartphone and the tablet. The graphics for the game are excellent and the sound effects are great! However, I did find the gameplay to get a little repetitive after awhile. The first time that I played it, I did not even realize there was a time bar. No matter what I did, it did not seem to run me out of time. Eventually I got bored of doing the same thing over and over again and stopped playing.

The second time I played the game I payed more attention to the achievements and in-game trophy system and found the game to be more of a challenge, but I had a bit of difficulty always jumping to the platform I wanted. Unfortunately, when you swipe your finger in an arc from one platform to another it does not necessarily mean that you will arrive safely at that platform. You only have control of the arc of the jump not the power of the jump or the landing, which makes the controls a little shaky if you want to feel like you are completely in control of the character.

Addictive:

Although Herman the Hermit can be addicting after dedicating more time to playing it your initial reaction will probably be one of repetition when you first play this game. Like I stated before I was able to play this game for over 10 minutes without noticing the timer the first time I played it. It was not until I started paying attention to the trophies and in-game achievements that I really found this game to be addictive.

Graphics:

The graphics and sound effects for Herman the Hermit is where this game really shines! The animations are fantastic especially for power-ups. When Herman jumps on the back of a rocket he turns his head towards the gamer like he is giving a thumbs up with a big smile! When he collects the lightning power-up he jumps from platform to platform zapping himself with lightning and showing his skeleton, and all the while the game takes place with moving platforms and backgrounds. My only quip is that the background environment doesn’t change.

Accelerometer, Vibration & Sound:

Unfortunately Herman the Hermit does not make any use of Vibration or the Accelerometer and to be honest I think the lack of Accelerometer use may be a miss for the game. It features mediocre controls currently and offers no variation on the standard control scheme. Although I normally am not a fan of accelerometer controls in games I could see how controlling the angle of Herman’s jump with the accelerometer could be an amusing twist to the game, and touch screen controls could still be used to force the jump. Although this is not necessary to enjoy the game at least some revamping of the current touch screen controls should be done in order to make this game easier to play.

On the bright side the sound effects are awesome for Herman the Hermit! He makes sounds when he jumps, you hear a helicopter sound when he flies with his stick, and he pleasantly “woohoos” whenever he picks up a power-up and begins to fly! The music is also excellent and a perfect compliment to the game environment!

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