PENGUINS!!! That's right, in today's flash game review we take a brief look at a game called Learn to Fly. this game involves a bit of control, some timing, and a touch of intelligence... the perfect combination in my book.

The game, hosted on Kongregate, puts you in charge of a penguin who is trying to learn to fly I suppose... really the game plot is just a hilarious excuse to have a penguin with a glider and rockets strapped to it's back traveling at hundreds of miles per hour through the air. However, even with this fault, which makes no sense at all, the game still manages to entertain greatly... in fact it might top the charts with how hilarious it is to watch and play.

So the basic premise is you have a penguin traveling down a ramp of a given height, and once he reaches the bottom he will fly out into the sky and attempt certain goals. Goals correspond to the given level, so maybe it is a certain number of feet you must reach, or a speed or a height. Whatever the goal, each of the four stages has one.

Controls are fairly basic, once the penguin is in the air you use your controls to modify it's flight path, and the space bar triggers the rocket that might be strapped to it. The point in varying it's flight path is since once it hits the water it can bounce... it reminded of me and hitting the water with a skipping stone, the flatter the stone the better the bounce.

Items can be purchase at the store, with cash gained through achievements and how well you preformed during each jump. You can buy upgrades relating to lowering air resistance, or increasing rocket fuel and everything in between. And I mean the game, while not that hard is still fairly entertaining. Like tyhe penguin is hilarious to watch go off the ramp.

The goal in the game is of course to reach 6,000 feet traveled. This is most easily accomplished by just upgrading the hell out of everything that you have available, and then learning how to use your rockets. Since the game gives you a huge amount of data once you have an upgraded glider, try and minimize your wind resistance, while maximizing speed and elevation. If you do these few things your penguin will certainly learn to fly.

Again, this game isn't meant as a challenge, it shouldn't be hard, and won't take you three days. The graphics sounds and premise of a penguin who just wants to learn to fly will touch your heart... and well... hell just go out do what I say and play the game, it's fun you'll like it and enjoy wasting some time on it.

Rating:

Longevity: 2.5/5
Interface: 3.0/5
Addictiveness: 3.0/5
Sound: 3.0/5
Simplicity: 3.5/5

Overall: 3.0/5


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The thrilling, and long awaited sequel, Achievement Unlocked 2 really does build on where the first game left off. With 250 achievements to unlock, you can spend hours and hours... and hours on it. Well, if you suck, it only took me 45 minutes.

Found on Kongregate, this little gem really is absolutely hilarious to play, the point of it is to satire and poke fun at other flash games. and games in general which give achievements for no real reason. This review covers some of the comical action of the tiny elephant, and will touch on a few of the more obscure achievements... and yes I really did the entire game in 45 minutes, but I mean hey... I'm amazing so whatever.

So to start, when the game first loads up you unlock about a dozen achievements instantly. and a bunch more are unlocked from not even moving... which is also one, not moving that is. The elephant is controlled via the arrow keys... or for another achievement use WADS. Of course tho, several tasks present themselves on your quest to unlock achievements, including running in your wheel, drinking some water, filling the levels and collecting coins. Coins are placed sporadically throughout each level, and as we all know when there are coins, you must collect them at all costs. However, instead of being highly visible, they are incredibly tough to see which forces you to really run EVERYWHERE in the levels.

Speaking of levels, more are purchased through the in-game store, don't worry to much about the cost as it is rolled into the coins you pickup in the game. In fact buying levels is quite humorous, as the game doesn't take itself very seriously and so includes several comments from random sources which are all false. As you purchase levels, go and collect coins to buy more until you get to the roof... and the manor in which you travel is quite unique.

You see, Achievement Unlocked 2 makes great use of launchers that move the elephant up and down, these may defy the laws of gravity, but they are essential to moving around. You do jump quite high, but not high enough... it's never high enough is it now? Also there are horrible stalagmites that kill you in various ways, and platforms that teleport you all around. There is a slot machine, and a full octave worth of keys on a piano... and that is just to start.

This game has a massive amount of content considering that the time trial mode only allows for the first four minutes of game play. Seeing the nonstop flood of unlocking things is quite rewarding, but at some of them you feel rather silly. This feeling only goes towards the real message of the game which is to make fun and laugh at games that do this in a much more serious fashion.

CONGRATULATIONS, YOU KILLED YOUR FIRST ENEMY!

How many of us have played a stupid flash game, or console game that spits this message out, and we think to ourselves... my god was I supposed to be glad for that waste of a message... it reminds me of WoW.

The sounds work nicely for the game, there is a handy mute button, but no volume control, it doesn't really interfere with the game seeing as I liked the music. In 30 minutes I did get a good portion of the entire game done, but of course that is the easy part. I would recommend this to everyone, I mean it isn't a huge game, it won't make you want to play it for hours but it is definitely hilarious.

Rating:

Longevity: 3.5/5
Interface: 4.0/5
Addictiveness: 4.0/5
Sound: 3.5/5
Simplicity: 3.0/5

Overall: 3.6/5

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Good flash game RPGs are few and far between, so when you stumble across a really good one, you simply have to share it with the world, no matter how much it has already been played. Sonny on Kongregate, has been a favorite for a few years now, and I have played it before, so I thought it was time for it's own flash game review.

A lot can be said about Sonny, it has a ton of things to offer, I mean it has a reasonable amount of length, and multiple characters to control. The graphics are fairly sharp, and the sound effects fit right into the game environment. However that are a few features that get me hung up on, and some areas that definitely could be improved. Now, don't get this game confused with the Mardek RPG style of game play. It doesn't make you walk around and discover things and have random encounters or any of that fun stuff. Sonny is a much more straight forward game that relies more on combat, and thinking and planning. However because this game does include a leveling system, multiple types of characters, and items to buy and sell it really does belong as an RPG.

The game begins with a few questions, whats your name and what type of zombie do you want to be (yes you get to be a zombie). It then puts you directly into combat fighting along side someone, but don't worry this part of the game is very simple. Actually the entire game is fairly easy, with only a few fights being difficult, but more on that later. So as you finish the fight, lots of plot details unfold, you don't seem to remember much and all you know is fighting. Actually, the real game is in the plot, the actual game itself is fairly easy.

Essentially, you can chose between 4 main classes, each being based on a certain combat style. I had chosen the assassin type, which basically just does absurdly high burst damage. After each battle, you can find items, get gold, and earn experience. Also, you are encouraged to pickup each and every item as these are used in the future either to sell or to give to other party members. The game does a fairly good job at explaining how combat works, so I won't go to far in-depth. Essentially, you have a combat bar that is in the form of a circle, and you add abilities to it prior to combat. These abilities can have several different ways to be used but the most common cost is focus. Focus normally starts at 100, and is reduced with most abilities. It does not have a natural regeneration rate during combat, but other abilities will boost it, and after combat it does get reset.

The game lets you do a lot of customization when it comes to your abilities, and what you want to do. Each time you gain a level you get an ability point, as well as an attribute point. These points are spent that will let you define how your character will function as well as unlock and give access to new techniques.

The game is played out in 4 zones, 3 of which make up the main game content, and a 4th that is open ended and meant only for the baring brave... and those with to much time on their hands. The first 3 are all basically the same, they are viewed on a screen and have 3 rotating... circles or something. Each circle allows access to either a practice fight for experience and gold, a story fight which advances the game, and the item store to shop around.

Zones are completed after enough story advancing encounters, however you will find yourself needing to do some of the training ones simply to gian some levels. While this might seem like a time waste, it isn't. Should you die, you will simply see a small sign, and restart from a previous save point. Normally the auto save feature will take care of everything quite nicely.

This game really gets hung up on the fact that no other party member is controllable other than Sonny. If you want to throw him a heal, you can't. If you want to give him a buff, you can't. If you want to do anything, yeah you guess it, you can't. That really pissed me off the entire time, I mean what is the sense in having all of these wonderful characters if they are set on autopilot.

However, despite that flaw, this game still manages to keep me entertained and have reply value. It shouldn't take more than 30 minutes to get through the initial game, especially if you hit space and skip the plot details. After that the value would be in trying another class, not in grinding in that 4th zone endlessly, that is just a giant waste of time.

Rating:

Longevity: 3.0/5
Interface: 3.0/5
Addictiveness: 3.5/5
Sound: 4.0/5
Simplicity: 3.5/5

Overall: 3.4/5

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TOSS THE TURTLE! Well, 'toss' is not a very accurate word, fire out of a grotesquely large cannon would probably be better. This game promises to entertain you in many graphically filled ways...

Found on Kongregate, this game really does push the bounds of this genre, there are a plethora of flash games out there that involve launching something out of something trying to get the max distance... this one does it very well. The little things in this game make it good, like the turtles hilarious faces as he plummets against the ground, the awards for getting impaled on spikes, and hitting goombas. The music fits the game well, and the sounds are hilarious and don't get overly annoying after 20 or 30 shots, however bot are easy to disable if you want to.

The goal of the game is to buy everything at the shop, and shoot the turtle as far as possible... well at least that is about the only thing I can get from it. You complete this task by upgrading between rounds and then during the main game, once you have fired, controlling the little shelled friend as he travels through the air is done with the WADS keys. Actually, the first thing I noticed when I hit play on this title is the way the tutorial is designed, it isn't interactive, or long or anything, two simple pictures explain the entire game, brevity is wonderful.

So, that being said this game obviously doesn't have a difficulty factor, the longer you play the more money you get the better the items and farther your launch. It is a pretty simple system that ensures people will want to keep playing to get everything, but I mean it really is THAT simple. I did enjoy tho the variety of stuff that is created and ends up in your way. Early on you will find yourself controlling your flight to try and hit certain objects that propel you farther and farther, lots of good fun.

Many different types of upgrades are available including better weapons and high powered jet packs... even mini nukes can be purchased to propel the turtle sky-high and over incredible distances. The variety of upgrades is appreciated, however once you get the golden gun with it's golden bullets, everything else seems kinda stupid. This gun will instantly, and with only a single bullet, shoot the turtle that max horizontal speed, and massive vertical gain. It kinda solves the game, and allows you to clear 3,000,000 million feet without any problems at all.

The extraneous features such as medals and things on the screen as you fly do actually add to the game. In order to pass the 3 million milestone you really need to play for a long time and accumulate those medals. They give bonuses to certain features and parts of the game, and are next to essential to get. However the problem is that they are purely random, as almost all of them involve what things you land on or hit, and since that has no guarantee... well I am sure you can see the point. This game while entertaining and fun, and graphically pleasing... just doesn't have any sort of difficulty associated with it.

And that's perfectly acceptable as overall, this game, isn't supposed to be a challenge, it is an exercise in repeated aggression against small shelled animals. This game does preform like you want it to, short fast and to the point. It is the way we want it to be, and does what it promises, and that promise is entertainment for about an hour. I would definitely recommend this flash game, but then I'd say to quit whenever you get bored.

Rating:

Longevity: 2.5/5
Interface: 4.0/5
Addictiveness: 3.0/5
Sound: 3.5/5
Simplicity: 4.0/5

Overall: 3.4/5

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