iOS Gaming Weekend: Kickin Momma Review (iOS)

So, Kickin Momma, the comical offering from Hothead Games, and that’s definitely “Kickin” minus what should have been an apostrophe after the “n”, which is going to annoy me to no end, has been branded by many as a shameless clone of PopCap’s ‘Peggle’. Now, while Kickin Momma might follow the format of Peggle, which I guess at its most basic level is firing projectiles through a maze of pegs to score points and unlock new levels, I don’t think it is fair to brand it as the half-baked clone some have made it out to be. If we spent hours picking apart and grumbling about every single Bejeweled or Angry Birds copycat game, I don’t think we’d ever talk about anything else in the gaming community, and we’d all undoubtedly drown in our own bile.

So Kickin Momma kicks off with a large, blue, impoverished, erm… thing, I guess, named Momma (a Swarmite mother ,or queen). As she strolls down her local parade of shops, she spots a pretty necklace made of red jewels, but hasn’t a penny to her name to pay for it. Now instead of doing the sensible thing, i.e.  get caught up in the local hysteria of the moment and trash said jewellery store, swiping the necklace and maybe the matching earrings while she’s at it, Momma instead resorts to child abuse. Wow, this commentary is getting bleak; I thought I said this was comical? Distraught at the distinct lack of tacky neckwear in her life, Momma decides to head for the nearest cliff (I promise you, it gets less bleak!) to kick a few rocks across the imposing crevice. Inadvertently, she stumbles upon the very same gems needed to complete her necklace, concealed with rocks across the canyon. And thus a game is born! Momma’s offspring, the Swarmites, seem to enjoy aiding their mother in her new endeavour, and become her ammunition for gathering all the red gems she can find.

The presentation of the whole game is kooky multiplied by bizarre to the power of bananas! The aesthetics are bright and colourful throughout, with frequent firework displays and bursts of confetti for scoring highly, and the animation is solid throughout with very little lag or stuttering. Sound effects are perfect throughout, with various grunts, groans and noises coming from the Swarmites rebounding off pegs and obstacles, as well as Momma singing and gyrating to one side of the screen. The break-dancing she exhibits truly has to be seen to be believed. It is clear that the developers put an awful lot of thought into the design of the game, and wanted it to not just be another precocious-pinball-point-pillaging-plod-a-thon.