 Fishlabs of Germany, the maker of such ambitious and well-regarded titles as Deep 3D and Galaxy on Fire, have taken the plunge into new waters with another unique 3D experience for your mobile phone in Powerboat Challenge.
The feel in racing a powerboat thru a turn is different than a car. Momentum, buoyancy and build are all factors that come into play. Fishlabs models this feel nicely as your boat carves through the turns. You start by choosing from 4 racers and their boats each with unique handling, size and weight. One is short with a round bottom for turning another is long and sleek for top speed. There’s one that’s short and jet-like with low stability and finally a heavy, bulky one with good power. The boats can be upgraded as you progress through 4 distinct islands which gives the game a nice hook.
The wacky racers you can choose to play all have distinct personalities and pop in and out throughout the game to taunt or boast and they are all given short voice-overs at the beginning. This along with a nice intro tune, an island menu tune, the whoosh of your turbo and beeping when you pass the buoys are the extent of the sound FX. I’m pretty sure powerboat racing is LOUD so this silence took a while to get used to. All the better to concentrate on the racing.
These races are all about turning and your racing line as they all take place in narrow winding channels usually against 3 other racers so space is at a premium. You need to choose a good line to cut close to the buoys which builds up your turbo and hope one of the other boats don’t knock you off course. There is a significant amount of bumping and jostling for position as everyone goes for the optimum line. You can actually be knocked over or out of the water completely! And of course, you can do the same. This makes the beginning of a lot of the races a rough and tumble dash to the first buoy.
There is a strategic element to racing these beasts. You can skip a buoy to gain position even though you lose turbo and a little power. If other racers try to pass you can squeeze them out in the narrow channels or try to knock them into the bank or make them miss a buoy. When do you apply the turbo? All these racing decisions come into play especially in the later races. You may also sell upgrades enabling you to trade off say a little speed for more maneuverability.
Fishlabs continues to use the venerable Abyss engine in this game and it’s beginning to show its age. There is considerable pop-up evident which makes it a little hard to look too far ahead as you plan out the race. The graphics otherwise are very good with nice sky textures, bushes and lilies along the channels and ice modeling. This is the only mobile phone game I’ve ever seen that gives you the option of toggling on and off the graphic enhancements like water effects, lens flare and reflection. This is appreciated as with all effects on and 3 boats in front, my Nokia N73 turned into a slideshow.
The difficulty in this game ramps up nicely until the end when you’re faced with narrow courses filled with 90 degree turns and you understand why they put the word challenge in the title. I found myself longing for some wide open racing room.
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