King's Orders: Savages Chapter 1 Review

Life as a medieval king’s guard definitely would have had some perks to it back in the day. I imagine they had some privileges above the common folk, but King’s Orders shows a not-so-fun side of being a guard. Wrangling nasty savages in the countryside at the behest of the king is not a pleasant task and it has proven to be quite dangerous and life threatening. I think I would think twice about being a guard knowing some crazy, green beast could gobble me up at any moment.

As I hinted above, the premise of this game is to follow the good king’s orders to round up all the dangerous savages that threaten the castle. After the orders are cheerfully given by the king, he scampers off and leaves 15 of his bravest guards to surround each savage to trap them. The king isn't what we would call courageous. Tilting the iPhone directs the group surrounding the savage as the savage makes attacking advances. Players must be careful to keep the savage in the middle of the circle to avoid being snatched up and eaten if the savage gets too close. If a guard is eaten, the remaining guards tighten up the circle and it becomes harder to keep the savage contained.

The gameplay is more than basic and there are three game modes: easy, normal and hard. Each mode starts off very easy and very slowly increases in difficulty. Anyone really good at accelerometer-based games will have no problem mastering this game. Unfortunately there isn’t much variety to the game and I found myself getting bored quickly.

One great aspect of the game is the artwork. I love the hand-drawn character look. I wish there was more dialogue and cut scenes between the king and his guards. The king seems to have some funny attitude and I’d like to see more of it. I would also like to see more game modes and variety since the game can become very monotonous.

Overall I like what this indie developer has come up with and I think the game has a lot of potential. Seeing as how this game is entitled “Chapter One” I’m hoping the developers come out with more games like this that have more variety and storyline. As it stands now, I’d have a hard time fully recommending this game since I don’t see much replay value to it. Anyone wanting to give the it a whirl can try the Lite version first before committing to the $0.99 price tag.