App Review

I’ve decided to do a review on the app “Oven Break”.

“Oven Break” is a simple concept I suppose. You play as a gingerbread man with a candy cane on a quest to escape from the oven, hence the title “Oven Break”. When you get the app and open it there are two options, challenge mode and training mode, which I like because the training mode gives you a chance to get used to the way the game is played. There are only two buttons to press, one is jump and the other is slide. The gingerbread man runs automatically and there’s no stopping him, save for the obstacles. The obstacles are little gaps in the ground that you need to jump over, kind of like Mario, and various hanging things you need to slide under. Occasionally there are wider gaps between the running spaces. To pass those you must hook your candy cane on the objects dangling above the gap to swing over to the other end. To swing you hold Jump and Slide at the same time, sometimes in quick succession if the gap is especially wide and there are more dangling objects after the first one. These objects change with the level. There are 6 levels and they all look different. One is an oven and the hanging objects are turkeys on hooks. The dangling objects above the wide gaps are hooks as well, but without the turkey. The next level has different objects, glasses and chandeliers. Appropriate since the level is on a dining table. The gingerbread man begins to run faster throughout the levels, with a speed up on every new level, so the objects start coming faster! It can be difficult to avoid losing lives if you aren’t good at hitting buttons quickly. You only have two lives, but it isn’t that bad since you can gain back any lives you lose pretty fast. The way you earn points is by getting as many of the floating jelly beans as possible, like Pac Man. Within those jelly beans are letters, being ‘F’, ‘R’, ‘E’, ‘E’, ‘D’, ‘O’, and ‘M’ respectively.  As you collect the letters you spell out the word “FREEDOM” at the top of the screen. Once the word is spelled out completely you gain back a life you may have lost. There is no limit to how many times you can spell “FREEDOM” or how many times you can gain a lost life, so really this game can be played indefinitely. If you can beat all 6 levels, you gain one infinity level. The Infinity level never ends unless you die. Hours can go into this game; believe me, since it’s very addictive.

Oven break is very fun as well though and pretty much harmless for children too. It’s not a shooter game so there’s no blood or guts; parents don’t need to worry about their children getting nightmares from it. The controls are easy enough to understand. The design is very cute as well; the determined face of the gingerbread man is humorous. The designs of the levels are simple but still well designed. The infinity level is a nice touch; now you never have to stop playing! It’s good for long car rides, as long as you turn the sound off because the little noises and background music are kind of annoying in my opinion. I enjoy this game, and I’m sure many others will too. But be warned! IT IS ADDICTIVE!  Last I checked it was free at the App Store. Unfortunately there are adds you have to deal with, but overall it’s not that bad. There are updates I believe that have been added, but I’m not sure about them since I haven’t updated the app yet.

8/10