Why is everything that comes out of Australia so annoyingly good?
In sport, whatever they choose to take seriously they dominate, whether it’s driving cars or whacking cricket balls.
Daytime TV soaps – no use bothering because the Australians do these better than anyone else.
Need someone to play a heroic character in a movie? Just call upon one of their good-looking talented actors to do that.
Now it seems video games have fallen under an Aussie spell.
Firemint started the trend last year, bringing out the fantastic Flight Control and Real Racing for iPhone and iPod Touch.
Fellow Down Under-based studio Halfbrick is now enjoying huge success with its fantastic Fruit Ninja game for Apple’s mobile devices.
The game couldn’t be simpler to play, but gorgeously juicy presentation and fiendishly addictive gameplay make it one of the current must-have apps.
In classic mode, various types of fruit – from watermelons to pineapples and oranges to strawberries - shoot on to the screen from the bottom.
Using swipe gestures on the touch screen to mimic the movement of a sword, players must slice each piece of fruit in two without any falling back to the bottom.
Every dropped piece of fruit costs players one of their three lives.
Whenever a fruit is sliced it makes a deliciously squelchy sound and leaves a colourful splatter on the screen.
Each sliced fruit scores one point, though bonus points are available for combo attacks when multiple fruits are slashed with one swipe.
Games start off gently but become very tense when the speed and quantity of fruit are increased.
Lost lives are regained at every 100 points, but swipe one of the bombs which appear on screen and the game comes to an abrupt finish.
The aim in Fruit Ninja is to survive for as long as possible.
Zen mode changes the formula slightly. Here there are no bombs or lives – it’s just slice as many fruit as possible in 90 seconds.
The game keeps a record of high scores on the devices, with achievements and global leaderboards available through the OpenFeint social network system.
There is something remarkably satisfying about swiping a finger through virtual pieces of fruit and whenever a game ends there is always a strong temptation to have ‘just one more go’.
The game looks lovely and also has great sounds to convey the ninja part of its title.
Fruit Ninja is a superb great little game for a few minutes of fun when you have time to kill and a desire to slice up some fruit.
At only 59p it’s the perfect game to pick up and play as one of your five a day!
Verdict: 8 out of 10 – There isn’t much to Fruit Ninja but it’s so well presented and such fun to play that it’s one of the best casual time-killers in the App Store. Another big hit from Down Under.
Watch a crazy trailer for Fruit Ninja showing some oddly dressed people messing about with fruit, and also some gameplay action:
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