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When someone tells me about a game that features 'randomly generated' gameplay elements, I
can't help but cringe as it's either not as 'random' as the person suggests, or said randomness
gets in the way of an otherwise decent title. Sadly Tweet Land by Why Ideas and Tree Interactive
falls in to the second category and while the idea of having 'The Internet' influence
your game may sound great, it invariably results in an inconsistent experience.
Your task involves nothing more than taking control of a fast moving and extremely dextrous
vehicle as it slides its way around a side-scrolling highway, knocking cars out of the way to earn
points. Unfortunately 'tweets' are influencing the game and certain keywords (such as terrorist,
minefield, car accident, meteor, and so on) will bring these things to life, causing no
end of chaos that only gets worse as you unlock more keywords with each level.
Tweet Land is best described as a 'feast or famine' game in which you either experience
everything that could possibly go wrong happen all at once or experience almost no difficulty
thanks to generous power-ups or infrequent penalties. Much of this difficulty can be
offset with skill in navigating hazards, however the game's rather awkward collision detection
will see you losing lives with almost as much random abandon as the objects that spawn around
you. One major offender is the way in which 'destroyed' vehicles become flying projectiles
that can still harm you - as such weapons like the flamethrower become more of a penalty
as anything you shoot becomes a deadly hazard.
Other bugs including spawned objects making vehicles 'warp' across lanes only exacerbate
Tweet Land's already flawed gameplay.
It's a terrible shame that these features work against the game as the concept itself
is fantastically madcap and when things go right it's hard not to find the corners of
your mouth curling up in to a smile.
Another huge point in the game's favor is its detailed retrotastic pixel-art that manages
to clearly indicate most hazards while also emphasizing the madcap energy of so many things
happening at once.
There's a cunning and amusing arcade title buried amongst the collision problems, minor
bugs and overzealous random level generation, but whether or not you fall in love with Tweet
Land will rely on how patient or possibly how lucky you are.