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When you truly adore a game, sequels can be a scary thing. Sure, it’s more of what you love—but what if they mess it up? What if they abandon all the things you love for the sake of novelty? Well, Defender Chronicles [$1.99 / $2.99 / $4.99 (HD)] fans, let us put your fears to rest. We’ve had a chance to spend some time with Defender Chronicles II, and it seems to have everything the original had to offer. And every little bit of it is bigger, better, and sexier.

I spent the summer of 2009 consumed by the original. I had a brand new 3GS and pages of games, but Defender Chronicles – Legend of the Desert King was the one that devoured my time. Its mix of vertical tower defense and RPG conventions was completely irrestistable, and Gimka Entertainment and Menara Games propped it up with massive updates that added to its already substantial content. Defender Chronicles II is looking like it will contain that same potential for time investment, so you might want to clear your schedule in advance.

This game is leagues beyond its predecessor in terms of visual appeal, and that’s an achievement—as we pointed out way back in our review, Defender Chronicles was a looker in its time. But now every unit is more detailed and every animation is more fluid. And crisp—Retina support is in for iPhone, though apparently not for iPad. The game lives up to the rose-colored vision you may have of the original, but it’s much more refined, more up-to-date.

The gameplay has been similarly preserved. You’ll still spend your time turning flags into guilds and upgrading them through tiers of units, archers to rangers, squires to cavaliers. Strategy seems more important than ever before, with enemy units that take advantage of every potential weakness in your defense. Height and range are the biggest considerations as you scroll around massive, multi-tiered 2D maps. There are quite a few of those this time around, and they hit an almost Escher-esque level of complexity pretty quickly.

There isn’t much that’s changed outright, really. Voice actor George Ledoux returns to impress us with his Sean Connery impression, though he also pulls off an impressive lizardman. Heroes Melwen and the General return, but this time they’re accompanied by two new friends: Lovell and Elwyn, an archer and priest. The brand-new story of the heroes and their defence of Athelia against the Orcs and Forsaken is told through gorgeous comic-book cutscenes once more.

From our brief time with the game, it really seems like you’re going to be able to put in a ludicrous numbers of hours. There’s so much here for the player that wants to go deep, with heroes to level up and customize, hundreds of artifacts to locate and five difficulty levels and game modes to work through. The difficulty curve also feels a bit steeper, so if you’re already familiar with the game you shouldn’t be underwhelmed. If you’re feeling particularly cocky, you’ll be able to challenge yourself with a huge list of Game Center achievements and leaderboards.

Ultimately, it seems like Defender Chronicles II will be the perfect sort of sequel. It updates already excellent gameplay for a new generation of devices, and brings in all sorts of improvements in the process. It’s hard to imagine any Defender Chronicles fans being disappointed, and folks that are new to the series should be in for a treat. We’ll be taking a closer look at the game over the next couple weeks, and we’ll be back with our review after it hits the App Store on May 24th. In the meantime, the developers are posting regular previews in our discussion thread, so take a peek if your appetite isn’t already whetted enough.

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If you’re looking to spend at least one more dollar in THQ’s so-so wrestling game, WWE WrestleFest [$2.99 / HD], there’s no better time than now. A new IAP pack that includes a new arena and former and past crowd-pleasers Sexual Chocolate, Daniel Bryan, Edge, Mr. Perfect, and Eddie Guerrero is available for purchase.

THQ is branding this as the “Champions Pack,” which strikes us as kind of funny. Is it even possible to name a popular wrestler who hasn’t earned a belt or two over his surely-800 year career? Even Shamrock won championships. Shamrock, man. Anyway, if you’re interested in WrestleFest we highly suggest you read some reviews and community thoughts and check out the demo [Free / HD Free] before diving in. It’s definitely a mixed bag, and for those of you keep track at home, it still doesn’t support iCade for whatever reason.

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One of the world’s best CCGs on mobile, Ascension: Chronicle of the Godslayer [$.99], is now better looking and it’s packing more content. In a recent update, developer Incinerator Studios added retina support for iPad, as well as three new IAP card packs — Return of the Fallen, Storm of Souls, and an aptly named promotional pack called Promo Pack 1. It has also dropped in an “in-app purchase” manager, which allows you to restore, as well as buy, cards from within the app.

If this sounds good, go ahead and update Ascension. You’ll notice some new tweaks, too: fast-app switching is now supported and a new 28-day online game timer round out what is sounding like a pretty sweet update for the game’s most dedicated fans. It’s nice when this happens, right?

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Like most 2D platformer stars, Mr. Pop of Frenzy Pop [$0.99 / $0.99 (HD)] enjoys long walks on the beach, scouring levels for hidden items, and running and jumping through a series of trap-infested environments. Fortunately, the orange soda bottle’s bag of tricks distinguishes itself by extending quite a bit deeper than just running and jumping.

Throwing in elements from other popular platformers like League of Evil along with a fizzy maneuver all his own, Mr. Pop can wall-jump his way to greater heights, grind down walls to safety, and roll under spinning buzz saws and other hazards. The shades-wearing orange soda bottle also comes equipped with Pop Power. By holding the PP button in the lower right corner of the screen, Mr. Pop flips his top and fires fizzy bubbles, rocketing upward at super speed.

Passing levels requires you to master and seamlessly flow between maneuvers. Hop a saw blade, roll through tunnels, then alternate between floating and falling by using Pop Power in measured bursts so you don’t hurtle upwards and impale yourself on the blades above, nor drop onto the blades below; then grind down a wall and quickly bound down to safety before getting ready to mix and match maneuvers through the next stretch of sharp objects.

Mr. Pop’s defining trait is his Sonic-like speed. With the slightest tap of a virtual arrow, the carbonated hero goes from standstill to sprint. While Pop’s speed meshes with the rest of his slick move set to make you feel like a level-clearing ninja when plans go well, they often don’t. Most stages unleash scrolling traps like boulder-sized snowballs, blocks studded with the worst kinds of jaggies, and massive bosses, all chasing you across the screen or through an entire level. High-speed chases and picking my way through long spans of traps wouldn’t pose much of a problem if I had a proper controller, but virtual buttons infamous for their lack of precision often made some romps more frustrating than fun.

Touchy physics exacerbated my issues. Mr. Pop’s zero-to-sixty-in-.02-seconds momentum makes levels fly by, giving you little time to react to impending traps but no chance to slow down with something barreling down from behind. Again, that’s not so bad in and of itself. It was the inherent imprecision of non-tactile controls combined with the too-fast speed that often turned many levels into rinse-and-repeat exercises of: die, add the trap that did me in to a list of obstacles, then call up the whole level from memory and hope I can press each button just so in order to pass.

Buttons do respond when you press them dead on, but the control scheme itself occasionally hiccups. Left and right arrows sit in the left corner, jump and roll sit below PP on the right; but each set is fused together, so you’ll wind up pressing one when you meant the other. Standing still next to a wall then pressing jump makes Mr. Pop perform a wall jump if the last arrow button you pressed was in the direction of the wall—which, in most platformers, is usually the case.

Not exactly a move you want to perform when you’re hugging a wall on a narrow ledge adjacent to a bed of spikes. Holding the jump button during wall jumps registers as two jumps every time you connect with a solid surface, which can get you into trouble on levels covered in ceiling traps, and Mr. Pop flip-flops between grinding nice and easy, or shooting down as if the wall were coated in butter.

I harp on these issues only because platformers rely so heavily on precision and a controllable rate of movement. Frankly, other games in the App Store do everything Frenzy Pop does, and with tighter controls. But once you weed out some problems—learn to tap the jump button during wall jumps instead of holding it—and work around the rest, you’ll find an otherwise enjoyable platformer.

The variety of levels and their obstacles keep the pace quick and fresh, and the completionist in me enjoyed the extra challenge of hunting down the soda can hidden in each level and opening up unlockables such as races against an evil chunk of cheese and hard-mode stages that really put your handle on the controls to the test. Plus, flowing through complicated sets of traps really does feel good. It just takes a bit more effort than I’d like.

For only a dollar, the Frenzy Pop package includes several dozen levels and assorted unlockables from the start, with the promise of more worlds on the way soon. While the game’s content doesn’t yet measure up to other more padded entries in the App Store, what it does offer will keep you entertained, and for a fair asking price.

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Shark Dash [$0.99 / Free ] features all the trappings of a classic love story. At the tale’s outset, we meet our protagonist, a toy shark enjoying a romantic swim around the tub with his gal. Suddenly rubber ducks, the most vicious of water fowl, come splashing onto the scene and restrain our hero, who flails about while the diabolical ducks spirit his fair maiden away. Rather than flexing his fins, the shark sets off on his quest to save his lady love by solving a series of physics puzzles.

Swapping hungry sharks for Angry Birds [ $0.99 ] and googly-eyed ducks for slovenly hogs, Shark Dash oozes personality. Each level takes place in a tub filled with a mix of bath-time implements: Salts, soap bars, plastic rings, beach balls, and several unique props like explosive mines and inflatable blocks that burst at a touch.

Positioned around the tub are the scumbags that made off with your girl. Your goal is to pull back on your shark and line up your dotted trajectory like an expert billiards player, then release to send him careening into bath-time accessories like a pinball—blasting through speed tubes that fire you into the air, cleaving through chains that hold hanging platforms, knocking over structures to dump their feathery cargo into the water, swooping beneath the surface to gobble up stragglers. Once you’ve devoured all your prey, you move on to the next stage.

Besides dining on duck, each level poses two additional challenges: collect every coin, and try to meet the minimum number of moves needed to win. Hitting par or less on each level is optional, but presents the game’s greatest thrill. As you progress, levels gradually introduce new elements that make up Rube Goldberg-like constructions. Dots lining the bathtub drain show how many moves you have to finish the level until the game pulls the plug and throws victory out with the bath water.

You can spend all your available moves throwing yourself at ducks, brute-forcing your way from one level to the next. Or you can join the Shark Dash elite who analyze each layout, painstakingly calculate trajectories, and slingshot their sharks in just the right way to kick off a Goldberg sequence that ends with every last duck into your belly—usually in two moves or less. Watching a well-laid plan come off without a hitch brought about immense satisfaction and prompted me to retry stages until I scored a perfect rank.

Unfortunately, the game’s economy is its biggest flaw. Collecting the coins scattered around levels gives you the funds you need to skip tougher levels, buy elixirs to call mulligans on poorly executed moves, pick up new sharks, or break your bank and open up every level. The problem is, even netting every coin on every stage doesn’t fill your wallet fast enough.

You can get by without retry elixirs and new sharks (the game’s levels are divided across themed bathtubs, and you automatically receive control of a new shark whose abilities Gameloft designed specifically for his tub’s challenges), but at some point, you won’t have enough to skip a stage giving you trouble. That means either banging your shark’s head against a level’s porcelain walls until you figure out how to pass it, or admit defeat and buy IAP coin packs.

Don’t let an unbalanced economy make you shy away from Shark Dash, though. Cracking a level’s puzzle-like configuration is a real kick that comes wrapped in a fun theme, vibrant graphics, and, quite likely, the first and only time you’ll ever root for a shark.

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Season finales are undeniably difficult to pull off: they need to pull the disparate plots of the story together in a way that feels satisfying but not hackneyed, while still maintaining a sense of self-contained narrative. A serialized game like Sam & Max Beyond Time and Space carries the added weight of presenting us with the highest expression of the puzzles and mechanics its introduced thus far.

I’ve come to realize that the second half of Sam & Max Beyond Time and Space — say, starting with “Night of the Raving Dead,” [$4.99] and continuing through the finale, “What’s New Beelzebub?” [$4.99] — are funnier and generally better than the first two episodes. This is largely because the last three episodes are more tightly connected, with each cliffhanger transitioning smoothly into the next episode. They feel cohesive, and that makes me feel invested.

But it’s also because, in contrast to the procedural feel of the first two entries in the series “Ice Station Santa” and “Moai Better Blues,” these latter episodes are a perfect fit for the point-and-click adventure genre.

“Beelzebub”’s only narrative blunder comes during the series’ antagonists’ big reveal, which is funny enough on its own, but is probably much better if you’ve played Sam & Max Save the World as well. (This is a recurring problem for Beyond Time and Space as a whole, especially since Save the World isn’t available on the App Store.) Every thing else in “Beelzebub”  – every piece of dialogue, every joke, every plot twist, every fan-service callback — feels earned, not only because it has the rest of the series supporting it, but also because the audience has had to work for it.

Steve Purcell’s writing doesn’t waste time with exposition or lengthy explanations, and players who haven’t been paying attention since “Ice Station Santa” probably won’t make sense of each villain’s plans or of the haphazard and absurd sequence of events that lead up to “Beelzebub.” The jokes, the dialogue, and even the over-arching plot of the series come tumbling out, rapid-fire, and only the quick-witted and observant will get much out of it. Beyond Time and Space hedges its bets, of course: even if you miss something ostensibly important, the games are light-hearted and silly enough to keep moving forward. Nevertheless, Sam & Max hews to point-and-click mechanics that prize attentiveness and lateral thinking, and “Beelzebub,” more than any other episode in the series provides a narrative structure and presentation to match.

Beyond Time and Space is at its best deconstructing horror tropes and, while I liked the time travel puzzles from “Chariots of the Dogs [$4.99],” “Beelzebub” and “Raving Dead” have the best settings and ambiance. The finale tasks the Freelance Police with scrambling between the well-worn block near their office, caught in the middle of the apocalypse, and a snarky, tongue-in-cheek version of Fortune 500 Hell. It’s clever and atmospheric, and it drives the games most interesting puzzles, which involve attempting to disrupt Hell’s operations long enough to free some damned souls.

“Beelzebub”’s narrative hook literalizes an abstract idea like the afterlife and reduces it to another explorable screen to interact with. In other words, there’s no difference between Hell and the “real” world for Sam and Max, in the same way that there’s no difference between 1967 and 2008, or between being alive and being a zombie. It’s right there in the title: Beyond Time and Space. Without intellectualizing too much, that’s a pretty sophisticated concept, but Sam & Max is charming and self-aware enough to keep it in check. Purcell doesn’t let metaphysics get in the way of Max’ fart humor, and the result is a series that allows for outlandish puzzles and silly in-game logic without sacrificing pithy dialogue or character interaction. It’s also why, for example, one of “Beelzebub”’s puzzles can call for the death of Jimmy Two-Teeth’s entire family, and no one really has to feel bad about it.

There’s a lot to admire about the way “Beelzebub” illuminates and caps off the various narrative and thematic threads running through a five-game series, but its puzzles generally lack punch, an unfortunate side-effect of following the preternaturally clever “Chariots of the Dogs.” Over the course of Beyond Time and Space, the best puzzles have challenged our perception of the game world, mutating and iterating on inventory-based puzzle design with portals, zombies, and time travel. “Beelzebub” has a few standout puzzles, including a fourth-wall-breaking language trick, but is generally less ambitious in its design than previous titles.

Telltale is, as a rule, well-versed in designing accessible, intuitive puzzle games and “Beelzebub” is generally no exception, despite featuring a few textbook examples of adventure game pratfalls: guess-what-the-developer-is-thinking crops up once or twice, as do scenarios that require thorough, exhaustive clicking and hunting instead of puzzle-solving. “Beelzebub”’s occasional clunkiness is somewhat mitigated by a retroactive appreciation of the funny in-game logic, but that’s to substitute for the thrill that accompanies solving Sam & Max‘ best puzzles.

While “Beelzebub” lacks the unified theme of “Chariots of the Dogs,” it’s no slouch. A few missteps aside, the puzzles — while of the traditional match-this-item-with-this-NPC sort — are clever and well-realized, even if they tend to be a little on the nose. It’s still one of the best in the series, funnier than “Moai Better Blues” and with clearer puzzle design than “Raving Dead.” If you haven’t played any of Sam & Max Beyond Time and Space, now’s a good time to start: “What’s New Beelzebub” is a fine capstone to a great series.

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Say what you will about Gameloft, the developer occasionally does a good job of filling the App Store void with iOS versions of console staples. N.O.V.A. 3 [ $6.99 ], the third game in the company’s perennial FPS series is one such title.  Capitalizing on the success of the previous two titles, as well as offering full support for the latest and greatest in Apple hardware, N.O.V.A. 3 offers a great action-packed single player experience complete with some very impressive visuals.

Following the never-ending trials and tribulations of Kal Warden, N.O.V.A. 3 continues the story as Warden is yet again recalled into action, this time to the ruins of San Francisco to aid an old friend. From there, you’ll travel to several more planets, a derelict ship, and even the home planet of the Volterites. I’ll save the spoilers for those of you that care about the story, but suffice to Kal gets tasked with saving the human race (again) from certain doom and will go through humans, Volterites and Judgers alike to accomplish that feat.

You’ll be saving humanity via gameplay that should be largely familiar for genre veterans. Like its predecessor, N.O.V.A. 3 has you exploring a wide variety of locales while battling enemy archetypes and hitting objective-marker based goals that shouldn’t offer much in terms of surprise. Also, you can expect the occasional break from the on-foot battle heroics by piloting Mechs, manning the weaponry on top of AI driven trucks and serving as sniper support for other NPCs. By now, it should be apparent that Gameloft has uncovered the formula for a successful FPS, and while N.O.V.A. 3 doesn’t offer much in terms of revolutionary gameplay, it certainly succeeds in what it does implement.

One interesting inclusion is an in-game store that offers unique weapons and upgrades that takes currency you earn by completing single player levels. It’s nice to see a system that actually provides rewards proportionally to how well you complete a level run. Unfortunately, the inclusion of IAP to bypass said currency collection lessens experience somewhat.

A well-done FPS is in some ways far more reliant on its controls than other genres. Thankfully, N.O.V.A. 3 works within its limitations to provide a competent scheme for a touch screen. The standard dual-stick controls are available, as well as generous use of a swipe gestures for swapping weapons and powers. I was particularly a fan of the gyroscope inclusion, as proper use of that option goes a long way towards making the game’s aiming accurate and fun.

N.O.V.A. 3 plays well on the iPhone, but I found the screen to be a bit cramped compared to the roomy iPad controls. Either way, a host of options such as auto-aim, attempt to help even touch-screen novices blast away with ease. While I imagine there are some folks that will never get used to touchscreen controls for an FPS, the fact remains that N.O.V.A. 3’s control schemes do a decent job of letting you take out baddies and navigate the environments with ease.

By the way, those environments you’ll be traversing across look absolutely gorgeous. N.O.V.A. 3 takes full advantage of the hardware offerings of the iPhone 4S and new iPad, which leads to one of the most visually impressive FPS titles I’ve played on iOS. The textures, weather and visual effects – even the shadows are all well done and simply stunning.

As nice as the game looks on the small scree, N.O.V.A. 3 begs to be played on a new iPad. The larger retina-display of the tablet lets you truly appreciate just how far the visuals have come in the series. The fact that the game manages to look this good while successfully running (for the most part) at a decent framerate is probably the most impressive accomplishment. Granted, there were a few mishaps with the graphics engine, such as a few instances of falling through environments, the occasional slowdown when there’s a lot of action on the screen and the unusually lengthy loading screens (that occasionally make you think the game crashed), but these do little to detract from what is an otherwise impressive visual system.

It would be easy to simply classify N.O.V.A. 3 as impressive eye candy and leave it at that, but Gameloft deserves credit for continuing the trend of creating a well-rounded FPS experience complete with a full story-driven campaign, a plethora of control and gameplay options and a balanced gameplay experience. We sometimes talk about games that possess that certain something that make them ideal for showcasing the might of iOS. I’d argue that, while N.O.V.A. 3 may not necessarily be at the top of that shortlist, it has enough going for it to warrant being close to such a classification.

This is part one of our two-part N.O.V.A. 3 review. In previous N.O.V.A. games, multiplayer played a very large component of how much our community enjoyed the game. With our early review copy, there obviously wasn’t anyone to be found to play with online. As soon as the game is released, and we can spend some quality time with the multiplayer we’ll post a follow-up focusing on the multiplayer aspects of N.O.V.A. 3.

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In an age where game studios are talking to behavioral psychologists and hiring retention experts and monetization specialists in a rush to juice the most out of free-to-player gamers, there’s at least one studio developing free-to-play games that doesn’t care about metrics, compulsion loops, and user acquisition. Game business never informs game design at NimbleBit. Fun is first, the mechanics of free-to-play are secondary.

Pocket Planes is the next big thing from the two-man studio, and it’s philosophically linked with its other titles. Without shaking a virtual change cup in your face, Pocket Planes gives you a vibrant and customizable world and ownership over it as you ferry a fleet of planes from one airport to the next. Designers David and Ian Marsh believe that these components will be enough to organically drive the free-to-play aspect. No business trickery is required.

The Art Of Good Free-To-Play

“[Our] philosophy is to consider monetization as little as possible during the design of the game,” Ian tells TouchArcade. “The in-game currencies are balanced to be a natural part of the game without the option to even purchase more during design and beta,” he points out. “Adding IAP and deciding how much to charge is always one of the last things we do before launch. We take care to make sure that everything in the game is accessible and achievable without every purchasing IAP.”

Ian and David proved that this approach works with Tiny Tower. The game made money even though monetization aspects weren’t a focal point. The game also did well with critics, earning all sorts of amazing reviews and even a Game of the Year nod in 2011 from the editorial team at Apple. Millions of people played Tiny Tower, too.

Pocket Planes is still deeply in beta, but I’m as hopelessly … hooked on it as I was Tiny Tower. Every ten or so minutes I pick up my phone and plan more flights. When I’m not playing, I spend time thinking about new planes and creative ways to expand my cash and transport flow. Should I grind in my current selection of airports until I can buy New York’s airport? Or should I keep expanding with much smaller airports to broaden my empire, and slowly build up the necessary resources to acquire international hubs? What if I converted all my fleet to four-seat airplanes? How much could I earn then?

These are the questions running through my head, in part because the simulation aspect of the experience is so good. But I’m also just straight-up invested in the world that I’m creating, and I want to keep making it bigger and better. There are so many small, yet beautiful touches in Pocket Planes that drive my mania. I can name all my planes and customize each of my pilots. My passengers post their thoughts on an in-app Facebook client called “BitBook.” I can buy any airport that I can afford, and I can also upgrade it to make it bigger and better. I can build my planes and when I watch them fly, I can collect the game’s two currencies randomly floating in the air. Pocket Planes also knows when I’m flying. The day and night cycle is synced to the real world. When I receive a Push notification, my phone emits a soft airplane cabin ding.

These are the aspects that David and Ian believe drive users to spend. These are the things it spends all of its time developing. There is no conversation about loops or feedback. The duo spend their time making games with character, real progression, and meaningful stuff. Their games have a soul.

“I’m not sure if there is some kind of secret sauce, but we definitely focus a lot of time on adding lots of things to our simulation games that make them feel like a functional little world inside,” David tells us. “I think the stronger the feeling that there is a buzzing simulation going on inside the game, the more fun it is to influence it and use your actions to mould and direct it.”

“I agree with Dave completely,” Ian says. “The more detail and emotion you put into these little worlds the more immersed players become and the more they enjoy spending time with it.”

“I think the customization has a lot to do with it as well,” he continues. “That isn’t just a plane flying in the game, it is your plane that you named yourself and spent time finding the perfect paint job for. In Tiny Tower, it isn’t just a generic bakery, it’s Brad’s Bread with interior decoration of his choosing and hand picked employees that took work for him to recruit.”

David explains that Tiny Tower and the feedback blowing up NimbleBit’s inbox is actively informing the development of Pocket Planes. Users are lauding their game design ideals and are actually thanking David and Ian for making a fun game first.

“I think we definitely are trying to strike the same balance and attitude in all our future free-to-play games because it resonates with players and matches the type of games we prefer to play ourselves,” David says. “The other thing we have learned from Tiny Tower and also Pocket Frogs is that the more we can stimulate players imaginations the better. The kind of fan art and fan communities that have grown around those games is amazing and that is a target we are always aiming for.”

Pocket Planes is shaping up to be a tremendous game and my praise is coming at a time when more and more new free-to-play games continue to feel like skinner boxes instead of fun things to play with. Ian and David are doing important work here, proving that free-to-play doesn’t need to inform fundamental game design.

“Even without spending a dime, players become heavily invested in these worlds because of their character and charm — not some carefully crafted compulsion loop. That is what keeps them coming back,” Ian says.

Fun doesn’t need to cost a penny, and that’s what NimbleBit strives to make a reality with each release.

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I have to admit I’m behind on children’s cinema. I totally haven’t seen Dreamworks’ How to Train Your Dragon. Though they’re clearly from the same world, I’m pretty sure it doesn’t follow the same plot as PikPok’s DreamWorks Dragons: TapDragonDrop [ $1.99 ], which is about kids riding dragons to herd sheep. But really, that seems like an innovative solution to a common problem, no?

Though it takes a few levels to reveal its workings, DreamWorks Dragons is a game of logic puzzles. You’re given a few tools, things a dragon could reasonably be expected to do, like roaring, picking up rocks, smashing things and burning stuff. With them, you need to run through a series of levels about herding sheep into their pens. But the stakes are high: each step needs to be completed in the right order or you’ll end up withcharbroiled sheep on your hands. Mmm, mutton.

Once you’ve unlocked all of your dragon’s abilities, they line up in icons down the left side of the screen. This dragon is well-trained; just drag an icon for an action to the spot you want it to be performed and Toothless will handle it. He’ll fly there and act out your command, be it burning trees, crushing statues, or lifting and dropping rocks. The only thing he can’t do is carry the sheep for you, which is fair enough. I mean, would you let a dragon carry you around?

The game is balanced for a younger audience, of course, so it might take a while before it starts to pose a serious challenge. But while the difficulty curve is shallow, DreamWorks Dragons eventually gets pretty great. The sheep are incredibly vulnerable, and later levels are designed to take full advantage of that. A single mistake means you’ll probably roast a sheep, or drop it off a cliff, or feed it to a shark. No one wants that—or at least they wouldn’t if the animations weren’t so fantastic. I definitely killed sheep in every way possible just to, um, watch them die.

Morbid curiosity aside, killing sheep is not just a bad thing to do; it will also hurt your level rank. Each level has a three star rating to aim for, with one star awarded for completing the level, one star for saving all the sheep, and one star for doing it all within a set number of actions. At first it’s hard not to get three stars. But things pick up by around the midway point of the game.

Some of the later levels get pretty ridiculous, in fact, with drawbridges, catapults, gates and such to manage on top of the usual cliffs and rocks and bridges and hay. There are forty levels in the main game, with twenty more available via an in-app purchase. That second pack gives you the Deadly Nadder to control, which can use its tail spines to create ladders for sheep. This ability is nearly as silly as it looks, but it adds a new challenge into the mix.

Each group of 20 levels also has 9 hidden treasures to be found. Frustrated? Go treasure hunting, since it usually means burning down every stand of trees in your path. You’ll also unlock a bonus level for each set of three treasures you find. Once you’re through those, there’s one more way to play: most of the Game Center achievements revolve around “losing” sheep in a variety of horrifying ways.

If you’re not in the target audience, DreamWorks Dragons probably won’t blow you away. It takes a bit too long to get into and ultimately lacks in variety. But every aspect of the game has been built with PikPok’s trademark care. It’s hard to turn down gorgeous animation and well-crafted levels. If you’re a fan of How To Train Your Dragon, this game is definitely worth a download. If you’re not, you’ll still find a solid set of logic puzzles within. Given how awful movie tie-ins tend to be, DreamWorks Dragons deserves to be recognized. It’s definitely one of the good ones, so check it out—then swing by our discussion thread to share your thoughts.

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