Military march of the penguins Worms clones are a dime a dozen these days. Earlier copy-cats like Hedgewarsand GunBound remain a cinch to locate and download today — for free nonetheless– while more recent inspirations of Team17’s benchmark strategy game continue to pop up across a variety of modern formats. From Facebook to mobile devices, games such as American McGee’s and strive to replicate Worms’s massive success, all while attempting to bring something new to the table. But as any franchise’s base formula gets replicated time and time again, the rehashed premise can start to become stale. The only things capable of saving a potential clone from falling by the wayside are either an innovative twist to the main mechanics of the originator, or a respectful emulation of its premise paired with exceptional production values.

Crazy Penguin Catapult: Penquins are doing it for themselves! Launch your flightless friends into action; steer for the bad bears and free your comrades! Crazy Penguin Catapult, Launch a high-flying, penguin-rescue mission.

Digital Chocolate’s latest offering, looks to fall more into the latter category, choosing to optimize the overall experience towards a focus on convenience and handheld devices rather than rewrite the book on strategic arsenal-based gameplay. A spin-off of the still-popular Facebook game (which garnered a positive from us last year), this new offering shares many similarities with its social network progeny, but adds in a few twists and tweaks that make it less of a mere port, and more of a game all of its own. The first main difference from the facebook version is the touch controls, which make basic operation of the game a breeze.

Big buttons on the left and right of the screen command your penguin to move across the stage, while dragging a virtual spring beneath the character triggers a jump. Aiming shots mimics mouse control, utilizing click-and-hold mechanics to tweak power and position of each shot, firing your attack upon release. Another change with the iOS port is the removal of 4-on-4 matches and the use of special abilities, such as shields. This pared-down port keeps it simple, offering 1-on-1 matches where each player simply picks a weapon and shoots. The biggest change from the Facebook original however is the asynchronous gameplay. While the original Crazy Penguin Wars was played in real-time — with a clock that ran down requiring you to act fast and pull of shots before it was too late — this latest entry in the franchise abandons timers altogether. Instead, you are given a stamina bar and one shot per turn, limiting your total movement and allowing you to take your time to plan out a strategy.

This really gives you a chance to play around with manipulating the environment, as you can use terrain to your advantage either to trap your opponent or create a defense. While the ability to pop into the game for a turn and then jump back out again is well-suited for the short attention span many gamers-on-the-go demand, the complete lack of any synchronous gameplay mode feels like a bit of a missed opportunity. Rather than see one game through to the end in one sitting, you’ll instead build up a sporadic slew of half-finished games as you wait for opponents to take action. Thankfully, Digital Chocolate was smart enough to have the game inform you which opponents are currently online, and offers you the option to jump between games turn after turn, in an effort to minimize downtime and ensure you make the most out of that short bus ride or lunch break. Updates to the game are promised for the future, which will supposedly offer added features like the ability to chat with opponents, but there are some basic things that need to be addressed before bells and whistles are attached to the experience. First off, sometimes the game will just go black, with sound and music continuing to play. This happens mostly when heading back out to the home screen.