One of the most high profile Irish apps in recent times, can the Bernard Dunne-backed Sumo live up to it’s primetime billing?
Here at JOE we’re always on the lookout for the latest Irish apps and surely the Bernard Dunne-backed Sumo hasn’t failed to catch most of our reader’s attention in previous weeks.
From Irish games and digital services company, OmniMotion Technology, Sumo apparently represents a broader R&D investment of in excess of €2 million, and is the first in a range of next-generation casual and social games that the Irish firm plans to release this year.
In addition to its iPhone and iPad versions, Sumo’s desktop version incorporates next-generation ‘controller-free’ technology for PC and Mac and is the first game in the world to feature OmniMotion’s gesture recognition software ‘Motion-Flow’. It’s an impressive charge for just one title, so can Sumo become the Yokozuna of iPhone fighters?
One sumo vs 9 ninjas? This isn’t going to end well…
Surprisingly enough, Sumo isn’t actually a a fighter at all, rather it’s a physics-based combat and puzzle game that bears more than a passing resemblance to the Mario Party 2 mini-game Bumper Balls (anyone remember that?).
A quick fire-up of Sumo reveals a wealth of unlockable challenges, while the toughest mode to unlock, ‘Pick A Fight’ is arguably the feature most players would want to try out first – a CPU vs mode in which you can select the type and numbers of your opponent(s). Instead, Sumo wants you to learn how to master the game before embarrassing yourself.
To that end, ‘Sumo School’ provides 60 challenges, with each complete level unlocking a further three. Only by completing every challenge can you hope to unlock the full app’s features and trust me when I say that you will end up tearing your hair out if you try to unlock everything in one sitting.
Controlling an ultra-responsive albeit quite ugly sumo ball, OmniMotion are to be commended for throwing an assortment of ever-increasing frustration your way throughout each challenge.
Unforgiving learning curve
Think knocking a dummy ball out of a billiard-surrounded level is easy? How about if the dummies needed to be cracked at full pace instead, or if the dummies were replaced by ‘Ninjas’ and surrounded by fast-moving pillars? Or what if the ninjas were replaced by three die which all have to be turned over to reveal a six? No lie, the ‘SMASH some glass dummies’ task alone, which appears quite early, took me at least a half-hour, with the blood-curling scream that accompanies each death growing more tiresome at each attempt.
Aside from the ‘Sumo School’, a ‘Challenges’ mode becomes available after 10 successful school challenges. In order to unlock content for the ‘Pick A Fight’ mode, here you must complete a further 60 challenges, which are doubly difficult than before. Sumo really is one app that thrives on your tears and misfortune, though it’s extremely difficult to put down nonetheless.
Lastly, we have nothing but praise for Sumo’s innovative two player mode, which splits your iDevice horizontally and allows a second player to control their character in 1v1 challenges. Everything from the directional swipes to ‘Winner’ messages is inverted for the second player and it’s a wonder more two player apps haven’t taken such a novel approach.
Infuriatingly difficult at times but nearly impossible to resist, Sumo is a wonderful app and fantastic value for money. That the title is Irish is the cherry on top. We at JOE are looking forward to what OmniMotion has in store for the rest of the year but if their next app is anything like Sumo, it’ll be infuriating but rewarding in equal measure.
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