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Flip Out!

Developer:	Gorilla Systems
Publisher:	Atari
Game Type:	Puzzle
# of Players:

This review will begin with a Background of the game, which is mostly from the game manual. This should give potential buyers of this game a good feel for what the game is about. If you are already somewhat familiar whith the game, you may proceed directly to the Review section.

Background:

Controls
You control the cursor with your JOYPAD and you can flip tiles with any of the FIRE BUTTONS. The most important hint I can give you to successful game play is this: flip a tile, and the space underneath the next tile you flip is where the first tile will land.

The Vacations
Citizens of Planet Phrohmaj like to unwind from their busy lifestyle every so often, and visit the planet Earth. While we're on Earth we visit places like Yellowstone National Park, Mount Rushmore, and Easter Island. However, we are creatures of habit, and we just feel the need to flip things.

When we visit Yellowstone, our favorite attractions are the geysers. We color the area around the geysers to match our skin color in the same way that the tiles in the Great Tile Flipping Festival match the tile bases.

When we visit Mount Rushmore, we can't help but take advantage of the natural, flippable nature of the faces on the mountains. Your task is to put the faces back into the proper order, without dropping any of the faces!

Finally, we visit our favorite place - Easter Island. At this beautiful island paradise we go back to a more traditional tile feel, but we invoke the fascinating Heads that are all around Easter Island. We put the back row of tiles into the mouths of the Heads, and we make the mouths open and close. The cursor cannot move directly from Head to Head, nor can the cursor move into or out of a Head unless the mouth is open.

The Dining
When we citizens of Planet Phrohmaj grow hungry, we visit the Sphorkle Diner. The cuisine at the Sphorkle Diner is the best of all the Cheese Planet, but the food has to match the skin of the citizen eating the food. Otherwise, the food becomes inedible and rowdy. Your task is to match the proper food to the properly colored citizens.

Planets Hoopla and Pigskin
Over time, the citizens of the Cheese Planet got bored. We decided to add some variety to our lives, so we moved the Great Tile Flipping Festivals to different planets for a change of scenery. On these planets, the spectators are much rowdier, and there are even more competitors to play against.

The Zero-Gravity Arena
This arena, created in the orbit of the Cheese Planet, is one of the greater challenges of the Great Tile Flipping Festival. No citizens can view the Zero-Gravity challenge in person, but with the marvel of modern technology, they can still watch from the surface of the planet.

The play is the same: you must match the tiles to the proper position on the board. However, there are now three boards and many more tiles to keep track of.

The Fluffy Encounter
No spectators are allowed at this Final Event. Here, King Fluffy challenges you to see who is the master of Tile Flipping. He will use all of his knowledge and experience to keep you from replacing his as not only the Greatest of Tile Flippers, but also as King of Planet Phrohmaj.

The Citizens of the Cheese Planet
There are several classes of citizens on Planet Phrohmaj, and their rank in society is based on how well they play in the Great Tile Flipping Festival. From the spectators to the competitors to King Fluffy, all citizens participate in the Great Tile Flipping Festival.

Most of the citizens of Phrohmaj who go to the Great Tile Flipping Festival go simply to watch. These spectators wear green skin during the game for easy identification. Although they may wander out onto the playing field, they usually won't interrupt the game. The other class of citizen, the competitors, wear red skin, and they need to be watched carefully.

You have been given a place in the competitor class, the same social class a the Red Citizens. The competitor citizens gain status within their rank by causing you to drop a tile. You gain status within your rank by putting all the tiles in a level into the proper place on the tile board.

The Competitors
Here's a brief description of the various competitors:

• The Rodeo Rider will grab onto a tile and prevent the tile from flipping into the air. In order to buck him off, you must try to flip the tile he is on several times unitl he loses his grip.
• The Red Baron will jump onto the Tile Board and act as one of the tiles, forcing you to keep at least two tiles in the air while he is in play. After a few flights he gets tired and returns to the sidelines until he is ready to fly again.
• The Tile Eater When the Tile Eater eats a tile, he enters play as a tile. However, because the tile is covered by the Eater, it never belongs in a space on the board. Once the Eater is flipped a few times he will release the tile into play and go back to the sidelines until he hungers again.
• The Cursor Decoy The Cursor Decoy can turn himself into an almost exact duplicate of a cursor. Although he can be confusing, he does not pose much of a threat unless he is ignored for too long. If he is not flipped off the board, he will start flipping tiles off the board.
• The Tile Flipper A cousin to the Cursor Decoy, the Tile Flipper is able to throw tiles gracefully into the air.
• Gooey With his unique shape and excellent jumping abilities, Gooey acts as a tile in the same way as the Red Baron, but he is not affected by your Tile Flipping Cursor. Instead, Gooey will jump up for a few jumps when he sees an opportunity, and after a few jumps Gooey will go back to his place off of the board until he decides to jump in again.
• Corky Corky is a specialty competitor that likes Yellowstone National Park. During the contest at Yellowstone, Corky will interrupt a Geysers flow and prevent you from flipping the visiting citizens. After a few attempts to flip, Corky will jump back to the side and digest the nutrients that he absorbed.
• Graffiti Master and the Janitor A struggling art student, the Graffiti Master found his true calling in the Great Tile Flipping Festival at Mount Rushmore. The Graffiti Master sprays various tiles with Glopple-Glorb, preventing you from flipping the Graffiti pieces until the Janitor cleans them.
• Sluggy While in the Sphorkle Diner, Sluggy will jump onto a Diner's table, preventing you from flipping the food on that table. Trying to flip Sluggy will only make him stay longer, so it's best just to leave him alone.
• The Wizard The Wizard takes advantage of the excess magical energy on Easter Island to perform a couple of tricks to make your flipping more challenging. First, he freezes tiles in place, forcing you to break through the ice with several flips before you can flip the tile. Second, he paints individual tiles to disguise their color until you flip them.
• Space Slime Space Slime only compete in the Zero Gravity Arena. They travel along the boards of the arena flipping tiles as they go, and trying to prevent you from matching the tiles. They temporarily disperse into space when you flip them, but they reform quickly.
• King Fluffy Supreme Ruler of all Phrohmaj, King Fluffy is the Grandmaster of Tile Flipping. Armed with three devastating magical spells, he is prepared to battle to keep his title as King of Phrohmaj. King Fluffy can freeze tiles and change their color in much the same way as the Wizard. However, King Fluffy can freeze and change color on a much grander scale than the Wizard can. In addition, King Fluffy will take advantage of the fact that he can flip the tiles, and he won't just flip those tiles at the beginning of the game. You will need all the luck and skill you have to beat King Fluffy at the Great Tile Flipping Festival.

Gameplay
The basic premise of Flip Out! is to match colored tiles with the colored areas on the "board". You do this by flipping a tile into the air, then flipping the tile of the square that you want the first tile to land on. You must continue flipping until each tile is in it's correct position. There is one extra tile that doesn't belong on the board. If you aren't fast enough with your flipping, you will allow whatever tile was in the air last to hit the board, smashing it to pieces. You must always keep at least one tile in the air. To make things worse, there are various characters (or Competitors) that will disrupt your tile flipping. (see Background above for more info.)

The controls are simple and responsive. You move the cursor with the pad, and flip tiles with any of the three fire buttons. It may take a few tries to get used to the timing, but once you do it's very smooth. Like most great puzzle games, the beauty is in the simplicity. No overlays needed here!

Graphics
The graphics in Flip Out! are as good as it gets for puzzle games. The backgrounds are richly detailed, the tiles are crisp and colorful, and the various characters are well drawn and well animated. Things can get pretty hectic when you have several tiles in the air, plus a few competitors on the board, but the graphics don't get muddled or bogged down. Each of the different board "areas" have a distinct look, and all are crisp and clear.

Sound/Music
Both the sound effects and the music in Flip Out! are well done. Some of the characters make "cute" noises, especially when you flip them off a tile. The music fits well with the overall theme and gameplay. Not much you can say about sound in a puzzle game, except that Flip Out! manages to have plenty of it without becoming annoying.

Fun Factor
One word...Addicting! Once you start playing Flip Out!, it's very hard to stop. Like any good game, it starts out easy enough to sucker you in, but gets continually harder so you don't get bored.

Replay Value
Flip Out! should no doubt have you coming back for more...again and again. Some of the levels, especially the Zero-Gravity Arena, are VERY frustrating. It seems so simple, yet it can really get tough. So that you don't have to start over from the beginning every time, there is a handy save feature. There are 5 save-game slots that will save game and difficulty level through the last level you completed. If you think you've got the game licked, think again. There are four different difficulty levels (Normal, Hard, Insane, and Psychotic) to make your life miserable.

In the Hard level, the tiles are different colors while being flipped, but the same color when they land. In the Insane level, the only difference is that the tiles are the same color at all times. You will only know where the tiles go by putting them in the proper place and seeing them flash. The most difficult level is the Psychotic level. When playing in Psychotic mode, the tiles are still colored the same, but they will only flash once they are in the proper place. You will be forced to experiment to get the tiles in the proper place, then remember which tiles are in the right place so that you don't flip them again.

Summary

Gameplay
Graphics
Sound/Music
Fun Factor
Replay Value
Overall Rating

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