I have become a pretty big fan of relative newcomer Skyworks, and their iPhone games.  They do a fantastic job with detailed graphics and animation, while bringing what should be very familiar games to your iPhone/iPod Touch, often with a unique twist.

The latest entrant to their growing library of games is Slapshot Frenzy, which is based on hockey (as the name would imply).  In this one, you control two offensive players trying to score as many goals as possible. 

In Free Skate mode, it is just you against the goalie in a single period.  Classic Mode adds two defensive players trying to stop you, but also extends the game to three periods.  Since you only control the offense, the action only takes place on half the ice.  If the puck is shot passed the red line, then play stops and you will reset at center ice.

This game has fantastic action and, like I said, really nice animation (including a zamboni which clears the ice between periods).  I did, however, find it to be a bit difficult to control the players.  In order to move them around the ice, you will need to drag them with your finger.  I had two problems with this.  First, the players never seems to drag quite where I wanted them.  Second, my finger/hand was always getting in the way of the action.  It would have been better if they had included an on-screen control pad in the lower corner as many other games have done, allowing you to control the players without blocking the view.

Despite these inconveniences with the controls, however, I found this to be an incredibly addictive game.  I really liked the fact that Skyworks took what could have been an extremely complex game, and boiled it down to its most basic components.  There is no complicated play calling, just skate, pass, shoot (and really there is very little need for the passing either).  Like Funkyball World, which I reviewed yesterday, Slapshot Frenzy is one of those games which can fill the various free seconds you have during the day, or wile away a few hours.

Unlike Funkyball, however, I was disappointed by the save feature.  Games like this, which you use to fill those empty moments rely heavily on the ability to save a game midstream.  Because, let’s face it, when you finally reach the front of the line at the DMV, they will not wait for you to finish your game before arguing with you about whether or not to smile in your drivers license picture.  I found that when I saved and exited, the game would save my position in the game, but erase my score, resetting to zero.  Hopefully that is just a bug which can be easily fixed in a future update.

Finally, like all Skyworks games, you can track your high scores locally or compare scores online using the global leader board.  I really like these global leader boards, although I do always feel a pang of disappointment upon learning that my all time best score is not even close to enough to make the top 50 in the global high scores.

Slapshot Frenzy was developed by Skyworks, and is available from the iTunes App Store for the bargain basement price of $0.99.  Or try out the Lite version for free.

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