Toast Time Review

In Toast Time, players are in control of TERRY (Toast-Ejecting Recoil and Reload sYstem): an English toaster with an arsenal of bread-built projectiles. And, if they choose, a monocle and dapper hat. The bad guys are alien-like blobs determined to steal time by descending on TERRY's clock in droves.

Players tap where they want to shoot, and the bread bullets start flying. An added little twist has TERRY caroming off the ground and bouncing around the screen with each shot. Timing the shots with TERRY's maneuvers can be the key to passing a level. Especially on levels like "Rabid Fan Base" or "Fannying Around.” Just saying.

Toast Time consists of 45 levels of varying difficulty where players can unlock up to 16 bread-based weapons. For example: toasties, baguettes, bread pudding, and breadcrumbs. Toasties are two triangle slices shooting simultaneously, baguettes are multi-slice french bread missiles that work best stuck in the ground, bread pudding is a bomb that explodes into 20 toast pieces, and breadcrumbs produce a rapid-fire hail of bullets. The graphics and sounds are old-school arcade, which, like the 80s in general, is back in style. Shoot the crates that fall out of the sky to change weaponry mid-level, but each burst of new artillery lasts only so long. Accumulate enough crates to unlock more baked ammunition. And when it's COFFEE TIME, lookout - it's breakfast on steroids!

High speed shoot-em-up action ensues as the caffeinated toaster moves double-time to blast the blobs into infinity and beyond. The levels are 25 - 45 seconds on average, which can feel like nothing... or feel like forever. They have catchy names and their own individual tune: Out of the Frying Pan, Scone Henge, Integral Cerealism, The Breakfast Club, Drop It Like It’s Hot, and Cosmo Cheese on Toast just to name a few. The Ironman Mode is a challenge to finish all missions in one attempt. I’ll be practicing a bit more before attempting that one! The controls are a bit tricky sometimes, however - it’s hard to predict where TERRY will land, or the projectile will not hit where one thinks it would.

Toast Time is not the most challenging game, but it is fun. I think older folks, like me, enjoy the retro feel of the game while younger ones, like my son, enjoy the novelty and uniqueness. Overall it’s cute, creative, and entertaining. I say fire it up!