Another freebie recommended by PodGamer, albeit after a bit of a rant.

It’s from Donut Games, whose output is admired by many. I’ve never really, properly got on with any of their games, though. I’m not sure what it is, I really don’t, but they never quite gel for me. They don’t lack polish, they don’t lack content, the controls always work well, I have nothing against their graphical house style… I just always seem to be a little underwhelmed. I play the games for a while, decide I can’t be bothered getting three stars on every level and wander off.

At this point I do have to point out that they’re very generous in giving away many of their older games for free and I have played through them without spending a single, solitary penny. Complaining about them, therefore, means that I’m a bit of a dick.

It’s just that I can’t quite see why other people rave about them. Maybe it’s just that in this world of broken control systems, bugs and shovelware, that a reliable set of games that don’t have any actual problems are to be cherished.

Anyway, Rat On A Scooter XL. It’s not actually a series of levels you can get three stars on, after all that, but a set of four similar, randomly-generated, single-touch, endlessly-scrolling platform games. A bit like, well, all those other games like that. It’s basically the family version of Canabalt, replacing speed, tension and greyscale art with gentle acceleration and a happy little rat.

Rat On A Scooter XL

Ciao.

It’s all right, you know. It starts off slowly and gradually gets faster, the different modes are all worthwhile and it does seem to save my high scores.

I’d just rather play Canabalt, because I’m all about the pumping adrenaline and giant robots. Except, you know, Canabalt’s frame rate has been broken for months now and the developers don’t seem to be doing anything about it. Updates have come and gone, but on my 3GS Canabalt’s run like crap ever since the 4.0 upgrade and it’s not been any better on 4.1.

So Rat On A Scooter XL, then. It’s pretty good and it works, so I’m keeping it.