NESpresso: Game Reviews \ PC \ Noah's Ark Deluxe

Game Stats
System: PC
Genre: Puzzle
Players: 1
Memory used: Approx. 8.5 MB's (w/ installer)
Playtime: 00:01 / --:--
ESRB Rating: Everybody (6+)

Screenshots

Another Pop Cap hit with a biblical idea as you help Noah rescue all the animals from the rising flood waters.

As the bible story states (if you don't know the story)... The world was running amok with immorality as everybody was breaking the ten commandments, except for Noah & his family. God told Noah that it's going to rain for 40 days & 40 nights soon & God directed him to build a giant ark to store his family & two of every animal on the planet before great flood arrives.

In Noah's Ark, you try to save as many animals (in groups of two) before the flood waters takes the ark away.

As you can see in the screenshot, the graphics are basic, yet functional as you can see that each animal uses a different color. The only part of the game that you might be wondering about is where the flood waters are shown in the game. The flood waters are actually in the background & you'll only see the water level clearly on the left side of the screen, where Noah & the ark is. When the water gets up around Noah's knee, he'll run into the ark as your first warning. When the water starts flashing red, water level is dangerously high & you have a little time before your game ends.

The sounds in the game will remind you of "Old Mac Donald's Farm" as you'll hear the animals as they're rescued. The music is the same through the game as well that it can actually get annoying. Thankfully, you can kill the sounds within the game so you can play your own music.

The controls of the game is very easy as you'll only need the mouse to play & the keyboard is only needed to pause the game (with the space bar). There's really no need for the keyboard, so grab a mouse & point-n-click your way through. You can also click-n-drag for faster gameplay.

As for gameplay, it's practically a matching game where you try to match up the animal tiles. The catch is that you can only match tiles that are either touching each other or there's open spots between them. If you have difficulties finding possible matches, the game will show you where a possible match is. If you cannot make a move based on where the tiles are, the game will start abandoning animals (from the top down) until you can make a move. The downside is that abandoning animals make god angry & the flood waters will jump upwards. You can counteract this by making combos where you save mutliple sets of the same animal.

Noah's Ark contains 3 modes with 3 different difficulty levels. Action & Strategic modes are standard (one's timed & one isn't) where you try to save the groups of animals before the flood waters reach the ark. The other mode is Puzzle mode which plays just like Bejeweled where you match groups of 3 or more in a line before the flood waters reach the Ark.

One thing that you'll probably hate about this game is that it's quick to point out possible matches wether or not you need help. It periodically annoyed me as I was planning my starting moves for the level (trying to work in some combos) when I didn't need the help. However, it was helpful later in the level once moves became harder to see.

Noah's Ark is an OK game, but you'll probably want to save the $20 from the deluxe version & play the basic version online unless you don't have a web connection at home or you really llike the game.