Carnival Fiesta: Ride & Slide

Hands up if you enjoy or enjoyed playing Snake on your mobile phone? Be honest, and I think you’ll find your own hand creeping up among the multitude of other fans.

Unfortunately the classic game hasn’t really benefited in recent years due to being overtaken by a plethora of games available and arguably nothing quite good enough has been able to fill its place – that is, nothing until now! Let me introduce you to Carnival Fiesta: Ride & Slide!

From the title I had been expecting to begin with something a bit more in the same vein as Rollercoaster Tycoon or Theme Park. Not that I was disappointed to find that this was a novel new slant on the classic reaction testing Snake game, but it did take a little getting used to. In essence this is a turn left and right as you navigate your way round collecting people for your ride. As in snake, every person you collect adds an extra rollercoaster styled cart to the tail of your ever increasing train. You have two bonus items which you can collect and one obstacle item which will cause you to ‘CRASSH!’ should you touch it (as you would if you were to nudge into the edge of the playing area).

You have three levels of difficulty, which basically just causes you to encounter more obstacles and by increasing the speed you travel around the grid. The playing area takes shape as a 3D styled square which will take a little getting used to as left and right will translate as a more diagonal turn. To assist you with navigating around the playing area, the game makers have placed lines in a grid system to help. For me this aided in judging I was on target to collect or avoid objects and also to help judge the turning distance as you have to move quickly to ensure that you don’t miss a turn and end up pranging into yourself or the objects around you.

The score’s quite simply totted up by collecting the available items and adding people to your train. You have three lives to try and get the best score possible and only after you crash for the final time do you know what your score is. This score can then be shared globally and compared with others’ to see how you sit in the world rankings.

I would say that for those who have played Snake this is definitely like putting on your old comfortable slippers and ideal for you to get an unbelievably decent score. It’s definitely suitable for any age of player and equally you will be challenged and addicted by the simple game play.

Rating 85%

Positives

Nice graphics and cute animations

Frustrating and addictive in equal measures

Get to compete with others scores globally

Collecting items add to the bonus clock and adds more to the game

Negatives

Controls are a little sluggish

The speed of the game doesn’t increase as you play, it remains constant according to the difficulty level set (of which there’s three)

Simple and a little repetitive