Happy Flock Review

Ah, the joys of the pastoral life of a sheep dog. Your concerns are so simple: make certain that the sheep find the pen and stand ever-vigilant against the incursions of the fox. Keep your eyes peeled for the occasional buried treasure, of course, and, if you’re lucky, you’ll manage that unicorn/mystic dragon/blue Pegasus combo that will get you your Dream Castle, which you will hopefully place in one of the pastures which you have recently purchased with gold and gems. Truly, rural tranquility at its finest.

Happy Flock is a game about herding. Players will spend their time guiding a sheep dog around the screen, attempting to funnel their herd of creatures into a pen within a time limit while avoiding foxes and finding buried treasure. The visuals are bright and cheerful, bordering on saccharine. The writing is cute, and the soundtrack is adequate. The controls are responsive, such as they are – you can either control your dog by tapping or dragging, and your herd scatters from wherever he goes.

The problem with Happy Flock is simply this: there isn’t much game there. You swipe your finger around to make sheep (and other assorted animals) run towards the pen, but that’s more or less it. There is the management and building of your different fields, but these decisions seem to be mostly vanity driven, without an impact on gameplay. There are quests, but they don’t reflect any real skill - only tenacity and good luck.

Beyond occasionally having to tap really fast on a spot of dirt, there doesn’t seem to be anything at all to do in this game – that is, aside from make microtransactions. There are a lot of opportunities to spend gems – the game’s premium currency – and very few ways to earn them reliably, or in anything resembling a considerable number. Vanity items galore are available, as well as other fields in which to herd, but no real promise of new or engaging gameplay. For instance, when something other than a sheep gets added to your flock, it still behaves precisely as a sheep does, so who cares if I’m herding sheep or Pegasi or cats? Also, your animals run out of stamina rather quickly, necessitating either long periods of downtime or refreshments, readily purchasable with premium currency of course.

Happy Flock is fine for what it is – a bright and pretty time-waster, better designed for kids than adults. However, there are far better ways of blowing a few minutes on your iPad. The game offers nothing new, innovative, or engaging. Happy Flock isn’t bad, it’s just not particularly good.