Saving Private Sheep puts the player in control of a Sheep commander as he tries to reclaim their grazing lands from the nefarious Wolves. The game has a nice sense of humor and presents the characters in a great way with the Sheep general offering some insight to the game and the happenings in the Sheep-Wolf war. Featuring some very easy controls, pick-up-and-play mechanics, and a quirky storyline, it’s very apparent that the game was made with casual audiences in mind. Hardcore puzzle fans might balk at the game’s relative ease, there is still some fun to be had here.
While game features a quirky premise that involves a war between sheep and wolves with an overt WWII setting, the gameplay is a pretty straightforward puzzle experience. You have to get your Sheep, represented by a pentagon, to the platform below without having them fall off into Wolf territory. You do this by clearing away blocks and other objects that separate your Sheep and the platform, tapping on them in order to destroy them. The puzzles unfold in real-time with your piece falling to the platform right as you clear pieces out of your way.
At the end of each stage, your performance is ranked, with a Bronze through Gold rating issued for solving the puzzle with a higher ranking being netted for removing fewer pieces and completing the mission in less time.
The game throws a few elements in the mix to keep the missions interesting. Some missions will give you a Wolf pentagon piece instead of a Sheep, forcing you to get them to fall off the platform instead of land on it. Additionally, there are things like metal pieces that will block your way and cannot be destroyed – only worked around, and a few other changes and challenges thrown into the missions.
Saving Private Sheep has dirt-simple controls, requiring you to touch the on-screen objects that you want to destroy in order to take them out. The game itself is not terribly challenging, and most of the puzzles can easily be completed through simple trial-and-error. The only difficulty that the game possesses comes from trying to better your score by taking away fewer pieces more quickly, thus getting you a better ranking.
Saving Private Sheep is an interesting take on the genre, offering up a fun premise and some personality. However, the gameplay itself is very simplistic, and puzzle fans looking for more of a challenge will want to look elsewhere. That said, if you are a casual gamer looking for something quick and easy to play on your iPhone, then you could definitely do worse with your three bucks.
