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Fireman

Published by BondarchukV
Price $14.95
Download
Primary Genre Secondary Genre

Ah, the job of a fireman... it might be a dangerous one but I'm sure the rewards are worth it. Not only do you get the satisfaction of saving lives but you also get women lusting after you. At least that is what we are led to believe. One thing you probably don't know about firemen is that they have to solve puzzles on the job!

Ah, level complete. Would you just look at that pipe formation! Later Story levels have obstacles like this garden seat that's as big as a person...

Real firemen of course have to solve all sorts of puzzles, but in BondarchukV's Fireman, your job is to get water from the hydrant to the house by using various pieces of pipe. Yep, we have ourselves another Pipes game.

I've already had the pleasure of reviewing two previous Pipe games, Plummit and Soda Pipes. Both of these games had various ways to play, simple and obvious controls and sold graphics that aided play. Fireman keeps to the formula in much the same way but the game as a whole has less impact than other games in the genre.

Puzzle mode is a little bit frustrating, often leaving you with pieces of pipe in all sorts of places. Hmmmm... in more ways than one.

Fireman offers two modes of play, Story and Puzzle. The rules for both are very similar with Story mode pitching you against a timer to get water to a burning house before it turns to ashes and Puzzle mode asking you to use all of your pieces of pipe by creating a continuous pipe with no leaks.

Play is nice and simple with obvious controls proceeded by a short tutorial explaining how to play. Left mouse button picks up and places your pipes whilst the right mouse button spins the pieces 90 degrees. The playfield is a grid that forces placement in certain places only with a green highlight indicating that you can place your pipe and red telling you otherwise.

Visually, Fireman looks ok but overall presentation and in-game graphics are a long way from the Pipe games that we've previously seen at Bytten. Moulding the game around the Fireman scenario is a nice touch though. Audio is the usual series of happy tunes and neither raises or lowers the overall play experience.

As a puzzle game in its own right, Fireman is good, challenging fun with 100 levels to play through (50 story and 50 puzzle levels). However, as a contender to the Pipes throne I'm afraid it only manages a distant last place. Fireman just doesn't have the looks or variety offered by our previously reviewed games.

Fireman claims to be a new and exciting puzzle game with attractive modes but sadly we've seen this game before.

Graphics 60%
Sound 60%
Playability 65%
Longevity 70%
Overall Score 51%
Bronze Star

Published on 16 Sep 2005
Reviewed by Hayden Yale

Keywords: fireman review, bondarchukv reviews, bondarchukv games, fireman scores, pc game reviews, indie game reviews, independent gaming.