Penguinz

Description: Unrivaled Penguin gore mayhem in this action-packed shooter. 15 enemies and 4 bosses. 9 weapons with 33 upgrades and 6 special upgrades.

Kongai Card: Reinforced Breastplate
Requirements: Kill 200 enemies. This can be done on any difficulty setting.

Penguinz, on paper, doesn't seem to be much different from any other game of a similar nature. You play as a penguin, and you shoot up a variety of Antarctic adversaries, ranging from a wide variety of other penguins, to eskimo and.. polar bears. A game about penguins just wouldn't be complete without gun-toting bears, would it? Interestingly, I thought the penguin with a big sword was a take on Cloud Strife, but it turns out I was wrong. What a shame, because I was enjoying slaughtering masses of sword-wielding penguins with that in mind.

There's a variety of weapons you can get, but following a trend, your starting weapon has infinite ammo, which is a nice touch, but certainly something you'd come to expect from a game like this. Enemies drop items at random, and range from ammo, health and money. While health won't become an issue until, perhaps, level twenty, the use for it quickly becomes obvious past that point. If you're any decent at side-scrolling shooters like Penguinz, you'll probably have little trouble getting ANY of the achievements, let alone the card. If you missed the card, know that you can at least have fifty points for just an hour of your time.

My nitpicks with the game is that it should be considerably more difficult. Most enemies can't fire at an angle, and those that do are easily avoided. Once you get the minigun, the game is pretty much a breeze by that point, especially when you buy the upgrades for it. It's pretty much the Golden Ticket to fifty points, especially since you don't even have to complete the game to get the last badge. If you want a challenge, you can use another weapon, but with a minigun, you can mow down anything quickly and slowly pick up the items left behind.

Anyway, while the bosses aren't much better than the normal enemies, some actually are a challenge, but mostly only the later ones, and most of their bite is stolen with the advent of the minigun.

There's plenty of violence to be had, but the game is relatively unspectacular. Another one of those games that you pick up for the points and drop like a bad habit and move on to the next experiment.

Rating: 6/10

Achievement: Carbon Offset Funding (Easy - 5 Points)
Description: Earn $100,000 in a single game.
Tips: This comes naturally through normal progression through the game.

Achievement: "It's Coming Right For Us!" (Medium - 15 Points)
Description: Encounter all 19 enemies in Penguinz.
Tips: Another badge that comes naturally through normal progression. You'll get this long before you get the last badge.

Achievement: Antarctic Chainsaw Massacre (Hard - 30 Points)
Description: Defeat Clive, king bird of Antarctica.
Tips: More progression goodness! Seeing as there's no alternate methods of play, this is only a natural course of action. Defeating Clive just takes quick fingers on the up arrow, and a heavy mouse finger. Oh, and some decent aim and, if you're this far, you probably have the minigun, so it's an easy win, if you max out your ammo.

Miscellaneous Tips: Don't invest in the Rocket Launcher. It takes too much ammo to fire and doesn't even seem to have splash damage. Avoid at all costs. The AK-47 should support you until you can have enough money to get a minigun, if you're careful.