Sea Stars Review — Swim and jump through an adorable dolphin’s colorful world

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By: Hothead Games

Version #: 1.2

Date Released: 2011-12-14

Developer: Hothead Games, Inc.

Price: Free

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Sea Stars looks like it’s made for kids. The graphics, coupled with buoyant background music, are styled after brightly colored cartoons, with a cute dolphin named Dante swimming through and jumping in and out of a side-scrolling sea. Its single control also points to a kids-oriented mindset. You only need one finger to play: tap and hold on the screen to make Dante dive into the water and release to make him leap skyward. But Sea Stars is not just for kids, for although it sports vivid colors and features an easily mastered manner of controlling the game character, Sea Stars actually offers enough challenge and replay factor to satisfy even the veteran iOS gamer in you.

Had it been concerned only with making an intelligent sea mammal journey through the open sea without any obstacles or attendant dangers whatsoever, Sea Stars might have been aptly labeled as kids-only. Fortunately for its sake Sea Stars also counts among its roster of game characters some aquatic creatures that exist to harm Dante, including stinging jellyfish and torpedoing crabs.

But to offset the harmful with the harmless, Sea Stars introduces the eponymous sea stars, any of which, when touched by Dante, conjures a friendly sea animal. It could be Dr. Scuttles the crab, Squinky the squid, or Molt the bird. Whichever of the three appears, it will be more than happy to temporarily help Dante by carrying the dolphin in its own special way, which entails a slight difference to the usual tap, hold, and release control.

In addition to Dr. Scuttles, Squinky, and Molt, there are also clams that offer instant, random power-ups, ranging from speed blasts to hazard eliminators. There are also the jolly rainbow birds, which Dante can call upon by completing a set of seven long jumps from the water and into the air and back. These chirpy creatures leave contrails of coins, which you are advised to collect and add to your stash normally filled by hitting the coins under and over the sea. Naturally, these coins are of value, in that they can be used to purchase power-ups and upgrades from the game’s built-in store. From the store you can also purchase new game characters to replace Dante, including Coral the female dolphin, Mr. Puddles the penguin, and Niji the narwhal. And if ever you are intent on buying an item but are short on coins, you can purchase different amounts of coins with your real money via your iTunes account.